Judge, Jury and Executioner
by Snafu1000
Summary: Words can wound as deeply as any bullet, and hesitation can be deadly for a cop on the street. Will Jane and Maura learn these lessons before it's too late? Chapter 7 up: Two life and death situations put Jane to the test
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Note: This is the first of my R&I reposts. See my profile for an explanation and as much of the soul-baring as I'm going to subject you to and accept my sincere apologies if you've read this before. 'Sins Of The Fathers' will be reposted in time, but because the stories cover much of the same time period in the Season 2-3 shift and deal with many of the same issues, albeit in different ways, I decided to only work on one of them at once. This one will be comparatively short (4-5 chapters, I think), so I'm doing it first._

_'Blue Blooded' is one of the only stories I deleted that seems to have gotten completely lost, so unless I decide to rewrite it, it won't be reappearing. I am working on a third R&I that is a lot lighter in tone than the other two, but it won't go up until it's done._

_For those of you new to the party, my R&I fics don't include Rizzles. There are plenty of great stories out there that cover that ground, and I enjoy the friendship between Jane and Maura, along with the incredible chemistry that is shared between every member of the cast._

_Shifting POV, but we'll start with Korsak, because I love the guy, and think that the character as written in the show is light-years better than the one in the books._

_Standard disclaimer: Rizzoli and Isles belong to Tess Gerritsen, Janet Tamaro and TNT. My thanks to Tess and Janet for creating them, and to Angie Harmon, Sasha Alexander and the rest of the cast for bringing them to life so perfectly._

* * *

It should've been a routine bust.

A known gangbanger had been found dead of multiple stab wounds, the bloody knife still in him and loaded with multiple latent prints that had drawn an immediate hit with over thirty points of agreement to those of Dwayne Edward Hightower, another known gang member with a rap sheet running back three years, beginning at the ripe old age of twelve.

Vince Korsak could remember when arresting a fifteen-year-old for murder was a rare occurrence that left him brooding for days about how someone so young could go so wrong, but these days, it was just business as usual, and now all it meant was that the kid was young enough to be cocky and stupid and easy to track down.

It was a slow day, so he rolled out with Frost and Rizzoli for the arrest, and sure enough, they found Hightower in a loose cluster of teens flying the colors of the Avenue King Crips, standing right outside the apartments where he lived with his mother.

Flat stares followed the two cars as they parked: Korsak just up the street from the group, Frost and Rizzoli down half a block and across the street. Before they'd closed half the distance, three of the kids rabbited in different directions, leaving half a dozen or so standing and watching impassively on the sidewalk.

"That one!" Jane's shout directed Korsak's eyes to the one that was racing down the street, past her Crown Vic, designer high tops flying over the pavement. Leaving the decoys to their paths, Rizzoli was after him like a greyhound on a hare, Frost only steps behind, but when Korsak tried to join the chase, he found himself blocked by the ones who hadn't run.

"Whoa, there, gramps, take it easy!"

"Watch where you goin' old man!"

"Oops, hey...sorry 'bout that!"

They were smart enough to not lay a hand on him, but by the time he'd shouldered his way past, the chase was well up the street. Korsak broke into a run, swearing to himself that tomorrow he was gonna by-God start going to the damned gym, assuming he didn't drop dead from a heart attack in the next few minutes. Dieting alone just wasn't cutting it; he could feel his heart already hammering in his chest, his lungs burning, but he kept his eyes ahead, and he saw when the routine bust went to hell in a handbasket, all of it unfolding in the staccato spaces between racing heartbeats.

_One._

The kid spinning without warning, pulling out the gun that had apparently replaced the knife he'd lost, eyes shifting between Rizzoli and Frost, cold calculation icing his expression.

_Two._

Rizzoli drawing as quick as a striking snake, leveling her gun, voice cracking like a whip.

"Drop it, kid!"

_Three._

The kid deciding, his eyes cold as the barrel of the gun swiveled toward Jane.

_Four._

Rizzoli fucking _hesitating_, then shifting her aim before she fired.

_Five._

The bullet taking Hightower high in the right shoulder, his body jerking with the impact, that hand releasing the gun, left hand holding on.

_Six_

Hightower squeezing off three wild shots with his left hand as he staggered back, one of them whining by Korsak's left ear.

_Seven._

Jane's head snapping back in a spray of blood.

_Eight._

Frost taking the shot: a fast double-tap, center of mass, taking the perp down. Textbook. What Rizzoli _should_ have fucking done.

_Nine._

Jane hitting the sidewalk hard, her gun tumbling from her hands, head bouncing on the concrete.

_Ten._

Ten heartbeats, less than half that in seconds, and it was a few more precious seconds before he reached Jane, dropping to his knees beside her and fumbling for his radio, seeing the blood pooling beneath her head, incipient heart attack forgotten.

"Officer down!" he roared into the mike. "I need a bus and backup at Lennox and Copeland, _now_!"

Frost was checking, making sure Hightower was dead and taking his gun, his eyes warily sweeping up and down the street. It was likely that the others wouldn't decide to join in...but not guaranteed, but Frost looked ready to take them all on, eyes blazing and teeth bared in a snarl as he turned in a swift circle, gun still up and ready.

"Korsak, how bad?" he demanded, ignoring the blood, his focus divided between his partner and the need to watch for evolving threats.

"Don't know. Rizzoli!" Korsak's hands were shaking as he turned her over to check the damage. Fear, yes...but anger, as well. He'd seen this coming for two fucking weeks, ever since she'd shot Doyle.

"_You gotta let it go, Jane. She didn't mean it. She's upset."_

"_You saw the way she looked at me, Korsak. You heard what she said. 'Judge, jury and executioner.' Is that what I am? Is that what I did?"_

"_You did your job, Jane. You did what you had to do."_

"_According to who? Cavanaugh? Doyle? Maura? What the hell right do I have to decide whether someone lives or dies?"_

Every rookie dealt with that doubt after a shooting, but Jane had been sure from the start, right and wrong clearly delineated in her mind in shades of black and white, with no room for the greys of uncertainty. She'd been lucky, too: all of her shootings had been clean, unquestionable even by Internal Affairs.

_All_ of them, damn it. Even Paddy Doyle, except that Dr. Isles hadn't seen it that way, even after the swift conclusion reached by the review board. He'd seen Jane's face, seen the way Maura's words had torn into her as brutally as any bullet, and he'd tried his damnedest to fix the damage as their estrangement dragged from days into weeks, knowing what those doubts could do at the wrong moment, hoping like hell they'd get it worked out.

It hadn't been enough.

"Jane!" Too much blood; he couldn't see a damn thing. He tore off his jacket, wadding it up and placing it under her head, using the sleeve to wipe the blood away from her face as the wail of sirens rose in the distance. "Stay with me, Rizzoli!" His fingers pressed at her throat, found the flutter of a pulse. He met Frost's eyes, saw his own anger reflected there: anger at more than Hightower. Barry had seen it, too. No way in hell could Jane have missed at that distance. Not by accident.

"Stay with me, damn it!"


	2. Chapter 2

_Author's Note: Thanks to all of you who have read, reviewed, faved & followed, and finally a chapter that is **not** a repost!_

* * *

_Officer down._

The two words ricocheted through the headquarters of the Boston Police Department like a stray bullet, turning the generally controlled chaos of every day operations into a buzzing hornet's nest of barely leashed anger and fear. The memories of the previous year's siege were too fresh, the wounds still barely healed. Feet pounded on linoleum tile, voices rang up and down the halls. As reinforcements were dispatched, weapons were checked, doors secured, protocols reviewed. If this was a prelude to a copycat attack on the HQ, they would not be taken by surprise again.

Inside her office, Maura Isles forced herself to keep typing the autopsy report before her, trying hard not to acknowledge the adrenaline that was coursing through her blood, speeding her heart and respiration rates, making her muscles tense in preparation for a burst of lifesaving activity. It served no purpose now, and despite the illogic of it, she held to the desperate hope that if she did not acknowledge the reports, seek more information, that the name that she dreaded hearing would not be involved. It simply couldn't be. Not again, not so soon. The odds of a police officer being shot on the job were surprisingly low; statistically speaking, construction work was a more dangerous job, so being shot more than once doubled already long odds, which meant -

"Doc?"

Lieutenant Cavanaugh stood in the door to her office, and she felt her heart plummet at the expression on his face. "No. God, no. Not Jane?" Her eyes pleaded with him, but he nodded heavily.

"No details yet, but she's alive, and they've taken her to Mass Gen." He hesitated, then added, "Did you want to ride with me?"

"Yes." Her hands were shaking as she reached for her purse; trying to drive right now would be foolish, but she still felt the urge to run to her car and race to Massachusetts General Hospital. It couldn't end like this, not when she hadn't apologized to Jane for being so awful to her, not when they hadn't spoken a word to each other outside of those required on the job for two weeks. "How...how quickly can we get there?"

The lieutenant's blue eyes were understanding. "I'll use the siren, Doc."

* * *

She'd spent much of the last two weeks trapped in the chaotic storm of emotions that had swept over her that day in the warehouse, that had been building ever since she had learned that her biological father was one of the most notorious criminals in Boston.

She'd been conflicted; how could she be otherwise? Patrick Doyle was a mobster, a murderer several times over, and yet he had pictures that he had taken of her from infancy onward, newspaper clippings that he had saved over the years. Unseen, he had been present at nearly every milestone in her life, from kindergarten graduation to her Distinguished Fellowship award from the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and her appointment to her current job as Chief Medical Examiner for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Even things that her adoptive parents had not been present for.

It had been an overwhelming revelation to a woman who could most kindly describe her childhood as one of 'benign neglect'. Her father had been there. Watching her. Proud of her. Loving her.

But he was a killer, a thief, an extortionist and God only knew what else. His blood ran in her veins. His DNA accounted for fifty percent of hers, and there _was_ scientific evidence that criminal behaviors could be inherited. Was her affinity for the dead a signal of more sinister potential within her? His behavior toward her hadn't helped her ambivalence. Kidnapping her. Forcing his way into her house and using a thug to coerce her at gunpoint to treat a bullet wound. Asking for her help to murder the man who had killed his son. Was this really love, and if it was, did she want it?

Add to that the sick awareness that if the truth of her paternity became public knowledge, her career in Boston could be at stake, and worse; any case she had worked on where Paddy Doyle was even tangentially involved could be called into question, reversed on appeal. Guilty men set free because of something she had no control over.

Then the warehouse, and what had started out as an exciting adventure, a chance to really be part of the world that Jane inhabited with such enviable ease, had turned into terror as Kevin Flynn pulled a gun on her.

And her father had saved her, shooting Flynn.

And Gabriel Dean, who should not have even been there, had shot her father.

And her father had shot Agent Dean.

And Jane had shot her father.

And anything remotely resembling reason and logic had shattered as Patrick Doyle had tumbled from the catwalk to crash onto the floor.

_Don't touch him! I mean it! Don't you dare touch him!_

She had said that to Jane...that and so, so much worse, and the most terrible part was that she had _meant_ every word, hadn't cared about the hurt in the detective's eyes, the way she flinched as Maura had hurled each accusation. She had _hated_ her for telling Dean about Doyle, betraying her trust and using Maura as bait to lure Doyle into an FBI trap. Hated Jane for shooting her father.

Reason had returned all too slowly, its merciless light revealing her hysterical assumptions for what they had been, even without the confirmation of the final incident report. Jane hadn't known that Dean would be there; he had put a GPS tracker on her car. Jane hadn't been expecting Doyle; she hadn't even been expecting Flynn to be armed. Maura _knew_ Jane; she would never have knowingly put her at that kind of risk. Jane was her best friend.

She'd proven that, hadn't she? Risking her career to keep Maura's secret, along with Barry and Vince, and even Tommy. Risking even more to -

No. She had promised herself not to think too deeply on that, for all their sakes. She let it go; it wasn't as though she didn't have plenty to feel guilty about without it.

She had let them lie for her, _expected_ Jane to lie to Dean for her, when she herself couldn't even utter an untruth without experiencing vasovagal syncope and hives. If Doyle hadn't been shot, arrested, she would have been asking Jane and Frost to cover up the murder of the only suspect in the investigation. More than their jobs would have been at stake; prison would have been a very real possibility. Only Doyle's arrest, and the subsequent uncovering of his list of dirty cops, had saved Jane's career, and still Maura had let the storm of irrational anger and betrayal rule her, tangled in the unexpected intensity of her emotions. Was it any wonder that Jane had begun to return her hateful remarks with barbs of her own, had stopped trying to bridge the distance that had opened between them? And even that had felt like another betrayal, an abandonment by the one person she had believed would never leave her.

She'd always kept her emotions tightly controlled, barely even allowing herself to _feel_ them, much less display her feelings. Jane had changed that, looking past her idiosyncrasies and insecurities to find someone that Maura hadn't known was inside her. She'd been able to laugh with the detective or cry; watch a baseball game or a documentary on neuroscience with equal pleasure, because it was Jane watching with her, teaching her about the game or making snarky comments about geeky science shows while absorbing facts that came out at unexpected times; to talk all night or say nothing at all, drowsing in front of the TV and leaning on Jane's shoulder; to go out to drink with a group of detectives and be treated as one of them, because Jane had shown her how to interact appropriately, and never gave up on her when she forgot and embarrassed herself with some socially inappropriate observation.

Patrick Doyle had given her life, but Jane Rizzoli had taught her to live. The Rizzoli clan had taken her in as one of their own; Angela was everything she had ever wanted her own mother to be. And Maura had repaid them by treating Jane like the criminal and murderer that her father really was. It had only been in the last few days that something resembling sanity had returned, bringing with it a wash of shame and fear that had paralyzed her as completely as the anger had overwhelmed her. She'd been fighting for the courage to approach Jane, apologize, beg for forgiveness if she had to, because she had never felt more alone in her life, never missed anyone the way she missed her best friend, but she'd been held back by the bleak certainty that Jane would turn away from her, and now...

Silent tears rolled down her cheeks as she stared unseeing out the passenger window of Cavanaugh's city-issued sedan, the siren wailing and traffic pulling over to let them fly past. She'd been terrified before, when Jane had been hovering at death's door after shooting herself, but the addition of the crushing weight of guilt now made it nearly unbearable. If she died -

"Rizzoli's tough, Doc," Cavanaugh offered without taking his eyes off the road. "She'll be fine."

She nodded without looking at him. She didn't want to know whether he was trying to convince her or himself. Jane worked hard to project that air of invincibility, of the badass cop, but Maura had seen her doubts, seen her afraid, talked her through panic attacks after Hoyt, seen the grief that tore at her every time they worked a case where the victim was a child, witnessed her frustration as she battled her way through rehabilitation last year, terrified that she would never regain the ground she had lost. She wasn't invincible, and no one was immortal, and Maura felt a sudden surge of anger at the men who would accept the facade, let her put herself into harm's way time and again when they _knew_ the danger. The anger collapsed swiftly beneath the guilt. She had known it as well, known that she was the only one that Jane trusted enough to show any vulnerability to, known that Jane could be reckless when she was angry or hurt, and she had cut her off. She had been angry at her best friend for supposedly choosing Agent Dean over their friendship, but she had chosen Patrick Doyle over Jane, hadn't she?

She was out of the car almost before it had stopped, Cavanaugh forgotten as she ran through the doors of the emergency room. Korsak and Frost were in the waiting area. Barry saw her first, and his handsome, gentle features hardened into something that made her breath catch in her chest in the instant before he turned away from her.

"Barry?" Her voice wavered. Her estrangement had not just been with Jane; she'd barely dealt with any of the homicide detectives, letting Susie deliver her written reports. She'd seen Barry angry before, but never this angry, and never at _her_. "Barry, please, is she -" She couldn't finish the question, couldn't even _think_ it.

Korsak had turned to her as Frost had turned away, and while his expression was not as coldly hostile as the younger man's, there was no misreading the emotion there. Vince Korsak was a gentle soul who rescued lost animals and watched YouTube clips of puppies and kittens, but that gentleness was nowhere to be seen now, buried beneath a grim resolve.

"Sounds like she'll be all right," he told her in a clipped voice, striding toward her. "But before you get to say another damn word to her, you and I are gonna talk." He grabbed her upper arm, pulling her unceremoniously back toward the doors. They encountered Cavanaugh coming in; the lieutenant looked to be on the verge of reprimanding the sergeant, but after locking eyes with Korsak for a long moment, he nodded and stepped aside, leaving the detective to haul the doctor outside.

* * *

_A.N. - No worries, Vince would never hit a lady, but he **is** going to give voice to some thoughts that I had after 3x01._


	3. Chapter 3

_Author's Note: Many thanks for all the reviews, faves and follows! For those asking about the frequency of updates, I aim for a new chapter a week, but that will vary depending on my schedule and the persistence of any one-shots demanding my attention. I do have a full time job and home life that both require my regular (and frequently extended) presence, so thank you in advance for your patience!_

_Events in my one-shot 'Crossing Lines' are referenced in this chapter, though you can probably get the gist of what happened without reading it.  
_

_See Chapter 1 for the disclaimer.  
_

* * *

For his money, Sean Cavanaugh was convinced he had the best damn homicide squad in the country. The individual members each brought a hell of a lot to the table. He'd come up in the trenches with Vince Korsak in the seventies, when the Irish mob wars had decimated the city, leaving bodies all over the damn place and Paddy Doyle's crew in undisputed control of organized crime in Boston. Vince was a good cop, one that you could have at your back and never worry, but he'd never had a talent for tact or working connections, which was why he would finish out his career as a sergeant, while the Homicide slot had been intended to be just another stop for Sean on a climb that would hopefully end in the Commissioner's chair.

Or maybe not. He hadn't sold his soul to get this far, but there were definitely days when he felt as though he had sublet it, and in the last two years, he'd seen more than enough of the differences in the ways that the cops on the street viewed their jobs and the way that the brass thought they should be doing it. Some cases were expected to result in fast busts that would provide photo-ops for the brass, the higher-ups taking credit for the work while giving the cops that had actually put their asses on the line a pat on the head, and maybe a medal. On the politically sensitive cases, however, where the primary suspect just happened to be a councilman's son or a big campaign donor, they were nowhere to be found, locking themselves up in their downtown offices and sending the 'don't fuck this up' memos down from on high.

Cavanaugh was beginning to suspect that Homicide was as high as he'd be going, but he was increasingly finding himself okay with that. The pay was decent, and if the hours frequently sucked, he could look at himself in the mirror and meet the eyes of his kids without having to make rationalizations to himself or them. And it was his team that he had to thank for that. Korsak was the backbone: old-school gumshoe discipline, combined with a sense of honor that would put the whole damn Round Table to shame. Barry Frost was the brains, combining a whiz-kid mentality when it came to computers and the technical gadgets that they increasingly encountered in their work with an insightful mind and damn good instincts...and a surprising ability to kick ass when things got down and dirty.

Jane Rizzoli was the heart and soul of the unit, bridging the gap between Korsak's old-guard and Frost's new-school: solid instincts, keen intelligence and balls of titanium plated steel. And while Cavanaugh had read the riot act to one of the PR department who had referred to her as the BPD 'cover girl', he held onto enough political savvy to know that having one of the most recognizable faces in the department look the way she did was not necessarily a bad thing. All he had to do was keep her from opening her mouth when the brass was around.

Even better than the individual strengths of the squad was the fact that they worked well together: no glory grabbing, no infighting. The friction that did occur was used like a whetstone to sharpen their focus, and ever since Crowe had put in for and received his transfer to Sex Crimes (whoever approved _that_ had to have their head so far up their asses that oxygen was in short supply, but since no one had asked Sean Cavanaugh for his opinion, he hadn't provided it), the unit had been running like a well-oiled machine, racking up arrests with solid evidence that generally led to slam-dunk convictions, which meant that the DA's office loved him. Add to that the fact that his detectives got along great with the Chief Medical Examiner, who was one of the tops in her field, and as far as Cavanaugh was concerned, he'd hit the trifecta.

Then the wheels had come flying off two weeks ago. Bad enough that Patrick Doyle happened to be the biological father of Dr. Isles. Bad enough that his whole fucking squad had known this and kept him in the dark for the better part of two years. Bad enough that Rizzoli spilled the beans to the goddamn FBI agent she was screwing. Any one of those alone would have been sufficient to send his blood pressure spiking and his hand reaching for the bottle of antacids that he kept in the lower drawer on the right side of his desk. No, as if all that wasn't bad enough, said FBI agent saw fit to put a fucking GPS tracer on his detective's vehicle, follow her to a bust that the feds had not been invited to and turn it into the fucking OK Corral!

End result: one dead suspect (saving the taxpayers of Boston a shitload of money, as far as he was concerned), one wounded FBI agent (who he would have happily shot himself for being the glory-grabbing bastard that he was), one wounded but apprehended Paddy Doyle (who in addition to local notoriety, was also on the FBI's most wanted list), and one crack homicide investigation team with its mojo blown to hell.

The fallout had been ungodly. Most of the subsequent two weeks had been spent by Cavanaugh squeezing out every last drop of juice he'd managed to acquire on his climb to his current position, trying to keep the brass from dismantling his squad. Cops on the street were encouraged – hell, _expected_ - to cover up mistakes that were the result of miscalculations from higher up, and those weren't rare. Too many at the top had either forgotten what it was to be a police officer or never really known to begin with.

On a personal level, Cavanaugh couldn't fault his detectives for keeping Dr. Isles' family history a secret, even from him. He'd read the reports that each one had submitted, looked at the evidence. She hadn't known before Doyle's kid had gotten killed last year, and in the months since, she had found reasons to recuse herself from any case that even smelled as though Doyle could be involved. The DA said that there were bound to be appeals, but that none of them would take. The woman's notes were extensive, flawless, and based entirely upon physical evidence. That wasn't the problem.

No, what had the higher-ups pissed was that there was to be no loyalty greater than that shown to BPD, not even between the officers themselves. On the surface, it made sense: looking the other way for a dirty cop, just because he was your buddy...that was just plain wrong. But Isles wasn't dirty, and neither were his detectives, and he'd damn near come unglued when those IAB fuckers had come in, bound and determined to prove just that, with Captain John Connors leading the charge.

It had been common wisdom for years that Doyle had cops on his payroll, but the canny bastard kept them well hidden. It didn't take genius-level intelligence to know that he'd be careful about where he expended his resources. Homicide detectives were at the top of the hierarchy of the investigative divisions, the peaks of their careers. Too much to lose to risk it all by getting paid off, and the murders that could be linked to Doyle weren't as common now as they'd been twenty years ago. Not a good place to invest his money or whatever leverage he used instead. Organized crime had its fingers in lots of pies these days: racketeering, drugs, gambling, gunrunning, prostitution, loansharking. Even a mobster like Doyle would be looking for the most bang for his bucks, the cops in the position to do him the most good.

The seemingly random murder of an officer in an armed robbery gone wrong only hours after Doyle had been taken had seemed like nothing more than incredibly bad luck...until Cavanaugh discovered that said cop had been Wally Wisniewski, a veteran who'd been parked in Evidence Processing for several years, and that the evidence at the scene didn't support a botched robbery scenario.

That had been enough to start what Cavanaugh always called "The Itch": that niggling little feeling in his mind that wouldn't let him be. Everything, for every case, regardless of what unit worked it, was processed into Evidence and maintained there. Physical evidence. DNA. Witness lists. Confiscated firearms. It was a one-stop shop for case tampering, and Connors seemed almost determined to stay off the scent, chasing instead after Rizzoli with a single-mindedness that all but screamed of some ulterior motive.

'Demoting' Rizzoli to a desk in Evidence had served several purposes: it had gotten her out of the prick's line of sight, made it seem as if he was disciplining her (that would come later, in his own way and time), and he had known that if there was anything to be found down there, a pissed-off Jane Rizzoli _would_ find it. And she had: misappropriated guns and a dead IAB officer that had ultimately led them to Paddy Doyle's little black book of bought men, with John Connors' name at the top of the list. Between bagging Doyle and uncovering his list of dirty cops (none of whom were in Homicide), he'd managed to get the brass off of their backs. Hell, by the time he'd finished spinning it, the idiots had convinced themselves that using Isles to draw Doyle out, then shaking that tree for the rotten fruit had been their plan from the get-go.

Cavanaugh left them to their back-slapping. He had a unit to put back together. He'd kicked things off with a fire-and-brimstone session in his office about what would happen if any of them held out information on him, ever again. Korsak and Frost had manned up and taken it as a duly earned ass-reaming. Rizzoli had simply nodded and muttered an apology, the fire gone from her dark eyes, shoulders slumped in defeat.

He'd known why. He'd had partners that he felt closer to than his wife, and he'd known cops whose partnerships lasted longer than their marriages. The bonds formed in the trenches together were sealed in fire, and when they were torn asunder, it fucking hurt. But there was a chick component here that he wasn't certain how to factor in. Maura Isles was technically a civilian; he had no formal authority over her, or he'd have just locked them both in a room and ordered them to talk it out. So he'd waited, putting up with the general malcontent over Pike, and then the elephant that settled in the room when Dr. Isles came back to work, but maintained a cool distance from Homicide, except for when she and Rizzoli were trading verbal slaps like a pair of doused cats.

At the same time, he'd started to see something in Rizzoli that he didn't like: the slump-shouldered defeat was gone, replaced by a steely, razor-edged determination that she hadn't displayed since she was a rookie detective itching to prove herself. Then, it had gotten her pinned to a basement floor by Charles Hoyt, and now -

He didn't know what the fuck had happened out there today, but he blamed himself. For waiting. For not dragging her back in and making her talk it out. For not sending her back to the fucking shrink before returning her to full duty. Not that it had done her any good before. It was Dr. Isles who had brought her all the way back after Hoyt, after the shooting, after...shit, after everything. He'd come to count on the rapport between the two women as something that kept the frequently volatile Rizzoli grounded, and he'd had no idea what to do when Dr. Isles was the reason that his best detective was falling apart.

Striding in, he passed Vince dragging Dr. Isles back outside; his grip on her upper arm, while not what he'd use on a suspect, was far from gentle. They stopped, Cavanaugh's mouth opening to tell the sergeant to back off, but Korsak met his stare without flinching, and the anger and grief in the blue eyes, while burning hot, was under tight control. A quick glance at Dr. Isles showed surprise, distress, guilt, but no real fear of the sergeant. Vince Korsak had never hit a woman in his life, and Sean Cavanaugh had no fear that he would do so now, but maybe he could say something that would break the stalemate that had the whole damn division locked up. He nodded silently, stepped aside and moved forward to Frost, hearing the doors open and close behind him.

"How is she?"

"She'll make it." Frost's eyes slid past him for a moment, his features set in a mixture of anger and guilt. "Paramedics said that the bullet didn't penetrate the skull, don't know how just yet. I heard her swearing a blue streak a few minutes ago, so I'm guessing she's awake, and they let her brothers both go back, so it can't be too serious."

Cavanaugh nodded, relief washing through him. "Tell me what happened."

Frost did, letting his emotions subside beneath professional detachment, his words calm and factual, delivering each detail.

"She shot to wound," Cavanaugh said when he was done. "Deliberately."

"Yes, sir." Frost nodded slowly, his brown eyes grave.

"Shit." The second time she'd done that in two weeks, and he knew now exactly why Korsak was dragging Dr. Isles out for a talk. Cavanaugh had heard her parting words to Rizzoli outside the warehouse, and he'd hoped like hell she hadn't taken them to heart. He should have done more than hope, damn it. If Rizzoli couldn't get past this, she was done as a detective, done on the streets, period. When you were faced with an armed suspect, you shot to kill, and not just for your own safety. Those three wild shots could just have easily hit Frost, Korsak, some kid standing in a doorway watching. Jane would survive the wounding she had received today, but something like that would destroy her.

"You think Korsak is the best one to be talking to her?" he asked Frost.

"Sir, Doyle was pointing that gun at me when Jane shot him," the young detective said flatly. "I doubt I could manage to be half as polite as Korsak is going to be...and that ain't going to be much."

Cavanaugh considered this, nodded. "Fair enough." He dropped into a chair, picked up one of the magazines. Ladies Home Journal. Set it aside, grabbed a couple more. Redbook. Southern Living.

"Got last week's People," Frost offered with a smirk as he dropped his lanky frame into a chair. "Tom Cruise's divorce and Lindsey Lohan's latest turn in rehab. Hot stuff."

He glared at Frost, gave in. "Gimme," he muttered, grabbing the battered magazine.

_Gonna be a long fucking wait._

* * *

Maura wasn't used to being manhandled, but while there was a certain shock in being dragged out by an arm, there was an odd sort of satisfaction that Korsak was comfortable enough around her to treat her as roughly as he would another officer. He would never have done this to Pike, for instance. But then the reasons _why_ he was hauling her out of the ER came crashing back in, along with the almost absent thought that Jane would have thrown a fit if she had seen Maura being treated in this manner by anybody.

Or she would have before. Would she care at all now?

Would she be able to care?

Korsak released her suddenly and stepped away, looking almost ashamed. "Rizzoli would've kicked my ass if she saw me do that," he muttered, shoving his hands into his pockets, his expression bleak. "She almost cold-cocked Pike for trash-talking you," he added, glancing sideways at her. "Did you know that? Frankie and Frost had to drag her to the elevator."

"I knew," she whispered. Susie had told her about it; she had thanked her assistant politely for the information and said nothing more about it, letting the silent voice of her anger hiss that it was just one more example of how reckless Jane could be. "I knew," she repeated, unsure what else to say. It was plain that Korsak had plenty more to say, and she was suddenly afraid that it had to do with the one thing that she did _not_ want to know more about: Tommy O'Rourke. Not for the reasons that Jane and the others likely thought, however. It was best for all of them that she remain ignorant about the truth of what had led to the mob enforcer's death at Doyle's hands.

Maura had discovered an intriguing fact about herself: if something was a proven fact, known in her mind, she could not lie about it. Her skin would break out in hives, her respiration would increase to the point of hyperventilation and, if pressed, she would succumb to an occurrence of vasovagal syncope: fainting. Theory, supposition, intuition, knowledge confined to her heart (she knew that the cardiac muscle was incapable of retaining information, but she had begun to allow herself to express such colloquialisms, finding that they conveyed emotion in a much more satisfying manner): these were all completely different and protected by her ability to compartmentalize her emotions from her intellect. Because she didn't _know_ with irrefutable certainty (even if she _did_ know), she could answer questions calmly, without the least sign of distress, and she had. That horrid man, Connors, had questioned her at length, even going back to O'Rourke's murder, asking her if Jane had anything to do with the mobster's death, and she had been able to state with a convincing certainty that to her knowledge, she had not, pointing out that Jane had promptly delivered the cell phone that Doyle had given Maura to the crime lab for analysis. The lab's logbook proved that.

But she _had_ known, as soon as she had looked into their eyes in that underground garage. It hadn't just been Jane: Korsak and Frost had been involved, as well, and more than anything else, that brought home the danger she had been in. Jane could be overprotective, hypervigilant. It was understandable, given what she had been through, and it was sweet, if a bit exasperating at times, but Vince and Barry were both steady and practical, not prone to overreacting and equally protective of the woman that each man considered his partner. If they had let Jane make the call, if they had _helped _her, then there really had been a risk of Tommy O'Rourke killing her to get to Doyle. The realization had been sobering, terrifying, but on the heels of that had come the realization that the three detectives who stood before her, watching her so calmly, had put their jobs, their freedom on the line to protect her. It was humbling, exhilarating; it made her want to burst into tears, to hug each of them, but she maintained her professional mien, did nothing to confirm in her mind what her heart knew, because the only way that she could protect them in turn was to maintain her ignorance, preserve her ability to swear, under oath, if need be, that to her knowledge, none of them had done anything wrong.

How she had loved them for it, though. For giving her that sense of being protected, cared about, belonging, after a lifetime of never quite fitting in anywhere, even in her own family. _This_ was her family; that was what Jane had been telling her. How could she have forgotten, tossed that away for a man that she barely even knew? Treated them like the villains, when they were simply doing the jobs they had sworn to do? Treated Jane like -

"Vince, please...just tell me what happened, how she is, and then you can shout at me as much as you want to. I know that what I said -"

"No." His voice was sharp, his blue eyes piercing as he turned to face her so quickly that she took a startled step back. "No, you don't have any idea what you said, what you did...at least I hope like hell that you didn't know what it was gonna do to her." He shook his head, his jaw clenched. "Two hours ago, a suspect had a gun leveled at her, but she was trying _not_ to be judge and jury, _not _to kill him." Maura flinched as her own words were flung back at her with a scathing contempt. "She shot to wound him, just like she did with Patrick Doyle, but this time, she caught a bullet in the head."

"Oh, God." The breath left her lungs in an explosive rush, and her head spun. Instantly, Korsak was at her side, his earlier roughness gone as he guided her toward a bench with a supporting arm around her shoulders, easing her down until she felt the coolness of the stone beneath her. "Vince, is she...is she?" she couldn't finish the question as scenario after scenario assaulted her mind in dizzying clinical detail. Short of a bullet directly to the heart, there was nothing worse than a head wound. Dead. Blind. Unable to walk. Unable to talk. Persistent vegetative state.

"They think she's gonna be all right." Korsak got up, moved away from her, his hands deep in his pockets again. "Somehow, the bullet didn't penetrate the skull, but they're worried about swelling from the impact, and from where she slammed her head on the sidewalk when she went down."

Relief fluttered in her chest at that news, but it was restrained by the knowledge that things could still go wrong: concussion, swelling, subdural hematoma. The tight bands of fear and guilt constricting her chest refused to loosen, and she dropped her eyes to her hands, feeling the tears beginning to slide down her cheeks again. "Vince, I -"

"One second." Korsak cut her off. "Not even that long, really. That's how long a cop has when they are confronted with an armed suspect. In that amount of time, they have to evaluate the level of threat, decide how to respond and then do it. You sit down there in your lab and analyze and run tests and wait for them to come back and analyze some more and _then_ you make your decision. For that, you get days...hours, if the pressure is really on. Nothing wrong with that, that's just the way your job works. Not ours, though. Not Jane's."

He watched her, his eyes weary, all of his years showing on his face. "We're taught at the academy to respect our justice system, to let it do what it is designed to do, but we're also taught that there will be times that we will be forced to be judge, jury and - God help us - executioner. To make that decision. To protect the public. To protect our partner. To protect ourselves. Any cop that takes that duty lightly doesn't belong on the street, and Jane never did take it lightly. _Never_."

The last word was delivered with a grim force that made Maura wince.

"She had Hoyt dead to rights once, and no one would have said a word if she'd put that bullet through his chest instead of his hands, but she didn't. She left him for the justice system to deal with...until he hurt you. I read the final report of what happened in that warehouse. Doyle was raising his gun; he was going to shoot either Rizzoli or Frost. He'd already shot an FBI agent. Jane did exactly what she should have done, with one exception: she didn't kill him, and at that distance, if she had wanted him dead, he'd be dead. She did that for you, and you treated her like shit."

"Vince, I was upset." The words sounded pathetic in her own ears. "He's my father! He was only there to protect me!"

"He shot Flynn to protect you," Korsak countered flatly. "He shot Dean...and he would've shot Jane or Frost...to save his own ass. He's a career criminal, Maura, and he tried to make you an accessory to Tommy O'Rourke's murder. That don't exactly make him candidate for father of the year in my book."

Before she could reply, he shrugged. "That's a choice you're gonna have to make for yourself, though. Maybe you already have." His blue eyes watched her with the coolly probing gaze that she had seen him use on so many suspects. "I didn't hear you telling _Doyle_ not to shoot."

The words hit her like a slap in the face; she opened her mouth to protest, but realized that it was true. "I didn't think he would," she whispered, then, admitting it, "I didn't want to believe that he would." She'd been a naïve fool, ignoring the facts that were plain to see in favor of a childish yearning for a fairy-tale father who would love and protect her. What if Jane had heeded her plea, held her fire, and Doyle had shot again, hitting Jane or Barry?

"I'm not giving you a choice about Jane, though," Vince went on, still watching her with that neutral stare. "Make this right, Maura, even if you have to lie. You owe her that. And you owe Detective Frost an apology for even suggesting that Jane shouldn't have done everything in her power to protect her partner."

Maura wasn't sure what hurt more: the fact that everything that Korsak was saying was true, or that he thought she would need to lie to Jane. The tears dried up as suddenly as they had started to flow; self pity was something that she did not deserve, and she could feel her emotions withdrawing into the inner sanctum where she had kept them carefully sequestered for most of her life.

"You are correct, Detective Korsak," she said, her voice calm and precise, her tone the same one that had earned her the 'Queen of the Dead' sobriquet. "I owe you an apology, as well. All of you have shown me nothing but kindness and friendship, and I repaid that poorly. I am sorry."

The hard edges of his expression softened immediately, and he stepped forward, ready to embrace her already, but she stood quickly and stepped away. "Not...not yet, Vince," she managed, not wanting him to think she was rejecting him for what he had said. "I need to make things right with Jane...if I can."

"You will, Doc," he replied softly, not pushing the hug, but watching her with his old, gruff compassion. "Family's more than blood, and it doesn't just stop when you're mad at someone. She loves you."

"Maybe." The strongest, most resilient substances in the world had a breaking point. Titanium. Spider's silk. Love. It was entirely possible that she had pushed things past that breaking point.

_Blood is thicker than water. I'm blood. **She's** water._ Jane's words, spoken less than two weeks ago. If she still meant them, Maura had no one but herself to blame, but for Jane's sake, she had to try to make the detective understand how wrong her words had been, how wrong _she _had been. If Jane couldn't forgive Maura, hopefully she would at least believe her.

She returned to the waiting room, approached Barry hesitantly. "Detective Frost, I am truly sorry," she offered softly. "You and Jane were doing your jobs, and I had no right to suggest that you should have risked lives by doing otherwise. I was wrong. So very, very wrong, and I am sorry."

Barry's features melted into forgiveness as swiftly as Vince's had, and he stood. "Apology accepted, Doc." Again, she stepped away from the offered hug, the hollow feeling in her chest growing. She didn't deserve their forgiveness; she didn't deserve _them_.

Lieutenant Cavanaugh cleared his throat, looking uncomfortable. "Doc, you know that the scuttlebutt about using you to flush Doyle out is just the brass trying to put their spin on things, right? Rizzoli never would have agreed to that sting if she'd thought he'd show, or that Flynn would be packing."

She nodded. "I know." She did. She knew Jane. No one had ever been so protective of her. Not her parents, not Patrick Doyle, who had been quite willing to involve her in the murder that Jane and the others had taken such pains to keep her away from. "Is...is Angela here?" She hadn't spoken to Jane's mother since she had moved out of the guest house, and that estrangement hurt almost as much as her separation from Jane, but it hadn't been fair to put her between them. The idea of facing the woman that had treated her like a daughter, knowing that her words had gotten her real daughter shot, was almost more than she could contemplate, and she was torn between relief and dismay when Korsak shook his head.

"She took a couple of personal days, visiting family. Once we knew that the injury wasn't life-threatening, Frankie and Tommy wanted to wait to call her until they had some solid news."

Frost smirked. "You mean they're each trying to talk the other one into making the call." Korsak chuckled, conceding the point with a nod.

It was a welcome return of the banter that had once flown so freely, but Maura resisted being drawn in. She hadn't earned that right back yet, no matter how ready Frost and Korsak were to forgive and forget. "Someone should call her soon. I can't believe this hasn't hit the news yet, but it's only a matter of time -"

"Are you here for Detective Rizzoli?" She turned to see a tall, patrician looking woman in teal scrubs standing in the waiting room, a stethoscope draped around her neck.

"Yeah." Cavanaugh stood when Maura did not respond. "We work with her; I'm her commanding officer. How is she...Doc?" The last was obviously a guess. Cavanaugh was as old-school as Korsak, and though he hid it better, women outside of their stereotyped, gender-specified roles occasionally caught him off guard.

The woman nodded. "I'm Dr. Paulson, and if she were a cat, I'd say she went through at least four out of nine lives today in luck alone. The bullet struck the left side of her forehead at an angle, but instead of penetrating the skull, it burrowed beneath the scalp, exiting just behind her left ear. There's not even a fracture of the underlying bone, though she does have a moderate concussion." She shook her head, smiling bemusedly. "It's damn near a miracle."

"Bullet trajectories can do unexpected things, due to inherent instabilities resulting from subtle variations in projectile shape and propellant charge," Maura heard herself saying. "There is a case on record of a high-powered rifle bullet ricocheting off of an acoustic tile, which isn't much more than reinforced cork, and striking a young boy with enough energy remaining to penetrate the skull and kill him." She was babbling, Googlemouthing, trying to contain the wash of relief that had her fighting the urge to drop into a chair and cry.

Dr. Paulson nodded. "I read about that one, as well. Fortunately, this freak accident has a happier outcome. I would, however, like to keep her overnight for observation, which is a standard precaution with concussions, and I was hoping that there was someone here who might have more influence with Detective Rizzoli than her siblings. She is insisting on signing herself out of the hospital Against Medical Advice."

As one, three pairs of eyes turned expectantly toward Dr. Maura Isles.


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's Note: Thanks again for all of the reviews/follows/faves!_

_Jamie: You have hit on my one real complaint with the show. I love the lighter moments, but they rely on them way too often, when they have a stellar cast that could easily handle taking on the deeper and darker themes that get brushed over in favor of a neatly wrapped ending._

_See chapter 1 for the disclaimer._

* * *

"Dammit, Frankie, I swear if either of you call Ma, I'll kick both your asses!"

Cavanaugh glanced sideways at Maura with a wry smile. "Sounds normal enough to me."

"Maybe," she replied. Couldn't he hear the agitation underlying the angry words? The fear?

"Great!" Frankie exclaimed. "And if we _don't_ tell Ma, _she_ kills us – _oww!_ Lemeggo!"

Exchanging a wide-eyed look with Korsak and Frost, Maura quickened her steps, entering the treatment room to find Jane with her younger brother in a headlock, while Tommy was standing well away from the bed, eyes wide.

"I can hurt you _now_, Frankie," she growled in his ear. "Think about it."

"Let him go, Jane." Maura kept her voice calm. Irritability and aggression were occasional side effects of concussions, and even without a concussion, Jane was not known for her gentle temperament. "He's just worried about you."

Dark eyes lifted at her voice, and Maura couldn't help a gasp. Beneath the edges of the bandages that hid the bullet wounds and much of the left side of Jane's head, the skin had bruised an ugly blue-black across the forehead, along the cheek and beneath that eye, which was sporting a sizable starburst hemorrhage on the lateral sclera. It looked worse than it was; Maura tried to tell herself that, but it _looked_ terrifying.

Jane released her hold on her brother and shoved him away roughly, pain creasing her features at the movement and anger flashing in her eyes as her gaze swept from Maura to Cavanaugh to Vince and Barry before settling on Dr. Paulson. "What're you selling tickets?" she demanded angrily. "I don't remember asking for visitors."

"Your colleagues were worried about you, Detective Rizzoli," the doctor replied, unruffled by her patient's hostility. "I also hoped that one of them might be able to convince you that an overnight stay would be in your best interests."

"My best interests are in getting the fuck out of here!" Jane snapped, her gaze locking on Frost and Korsak. "What happened to Hightower?"

"The suspect was pronounced dead at the scene," Korsak reported, his tone deliberately detached, professional.

"I killed him, Jane," Barry added as Jane sank back against her pillow, her eyes shifting from anger to ebony pools of despair. "After he shot you."

"Which I will remind you is the reverse order in which I prefer that these incidents occur, Detective." Cavanaugh's voice was gently chiding, but firm.

Jane didn't acknowledge him. "Just at least tell me he did it," she muttered, staring down at her hands.

"Prints were a match, the shoes he was wearing still had the dead kid's name written on the soles, and the gun he was carrying has been tied to shootings at two armed robberies in the last two weeks," Korsak replied. "It was a clean shoot, Jane."

"Tell that to his family," Jane replied wearily, drawing her legs up, wrapping her arms around them and resting her head on her knees, the tumble of dark curls obscuring her face. Maura felt her heart clench in her chest. She had done this: put the thought of faces, families, behind the reality of the criminals that Jane faced each day. In war, soldiers were taught to dehumanize their opponents for a brutal but practical necessity; individuals who found themselves kidnapped were encouraged to try to form a connection with their captors for the same reason. Seeing someone as another person, a fellow human being with feelings and a family, made it that much harder to kill them. Jane had always had an incredible capacity for compassion, reaching out instinctively to comfort victims and survivors, but she had always been able to put it aside when confronted with a life and death situation.

Before she shot Patrick Doyle. Before Maura had made her doubt herself.

The detective's head came up, her eyes too bright, her face set in stubborn resolve. "Just get me whatever I need to sign," she ordered the physician. "I'm checking out. Now."

"Detective, I urge you to reconsider," Dr. Paulson told her seriously. "The first twelve to twenty-four hours after a concussion are a critical time to observe for signs of swelling or bleeding in the brain, and such things can occur very quickly."

"Well, just tell me what to look for, Doc, and I'll give you a call if I start having symptoms," Jane replied, swinging into a sitting position on the edge of the bed. "Where are my clothes?"

"They've got blood all over them, Jane," Frankie informed her, clearly not pleased with his sister's decision.

"So go to my place and get me some clean ones," she growled.

"Detective, the patient frequently is unable to recognize the symptoms of cerebral damage." Either Dr. Paulson had the patience of a saint, or she had worked with cops before. "Confusion and disorientation are often the first manifestations, and they could prevent you from realizing that your condition is worsening. At the very least, someone should stay with you to monitor your condition. You should be woken up every hour or so while you are sleeping to determine your level of responsiveness."

"Really?" Jane's voice was loaded with sarcasm. "That should be incredibly restful. One of these two can do that." She waved a hand at her brothers.

Frankie met Maura's eyes, a swift mutual agreement passing between them before he shook his head. "Jane, I gotta get back to work. The department is beefing up street presence in case there's any fallout from the shooting."

Jane scowled at him, shifting her gaze to her youngest brother. "Tommy?"

He held up his hands nervously. "I ain't no doctor, Jane. What if I screw it up and something happens to you? Maura's a doc!" He pointed at her eagerly. "She'd know what to do!"

As openings went, it lacked anything remotely resembling subtlety, but it would have to do. "I'll do it," she offered at once.

"No." Jane's response was immediate, as was the indignant look she directed at Dr. Paulson, bypassing Maura completely. "She works on dead people!"

"I have treated live patients any number of times," Maura reminded her. "Including you, Jane Rizzoli."

"What about Frost, Korsak?" Jane wasn't giving up, but Lieutenant Cavanaugh spoke up before either of them could respond.

"They've got incident reports to fill out, Rizzoli," he said matter-of-factly. "And as your commanding officer, I'm _ordering_ you: either you stay here in the hospital until they release you, or you have someone stay with you, and the only one here who's qualified is Dr. Isles. Is that understood?"

Rebellion flashed in dark eyes, but Jane knew when it was time to give up a fight. "Yes, sir," she muttered, her eyes on the floor, teeth worrying at her lower lip as she weighed her options.

Maura said nothing. It was a heartbreaking indication of how deep the rift between them had become that Jane even had to think about it. She hated hospitals with a passion; to her, they represented helplessness, defeat, weakness. She'd been like a caged animal by the time she'd been released after the shooting last year, and it had taken every ounce of influence that Maura had over her to keep her to the prescribed medical regimens then.

"All right, bring me the forms," she said at last, her eyes cutting briefly to Maura, then away just as quickly, though not before the M.E. saw something beneath the stubborn anger.

Fear. Badass Jane Rizzoli was afraid...of _her_.

It wasn't the most heartening of realizations, but it was perhaps better than the hate she'd dreaded seeing, or worse, indifference. Maybe it would be possible to mend the breach. Maybe. "I just need to get my car," she said, remembering that she hadn't driven here.

Cavanaugh nodded. "Officer Rizzoli, bring Detective Rizzoli some clean clothes, and then report back to duty. I'll take Dr. Isles back to HQ to get her car." He fixed Jane with an unwavering stare. "And you _will_ be here when she gets back."

Jane nodded, rolling back onto the bed and closing her eyes. "Yes, sir."

Maura looked worriedly to Vince and Barry. Maybe this wasn't the best time to be trying this; if Cavanaugh simply ordered Jane to remain in the hospital overnight, she would do it.

"The ball's in your court now, Doc," Korsak said softly as they stepped into the hall. Left unspoken was the second half of the statement: _Don't screw it up._

She nodded. "I know."

"Good luck, Dr. Isles," Dr. Paulson offered as she returned with a clipboard and pen, giving the M.E. a wry smile in passing. "I suspect you're going to need it."

If she only knew how true her words were! "Yes, I will," she said softly. "Thank you."

* * *

Despite Jane's agreement, Maura would not have been surprised to return to the hospital to discover that the detective had taken a cab home, but she was there, dressed in sweats and a t-shirt and carrying a bag of wound care supplies.

The ride home was a silent one, broken only when Jane glanced up and frowned as she took note of their surroundings. "Why are we going to your place?"

"Because I have medical supplies there," Maura replied, as reasonably as she could. "If complications arise, I can administer steroids or epinephrine quickly while waiting for the ambulance to arrive."

She more than half expected Jane to demand that they go to her apartment instead, but she simply muttered, "Whatever," and returned to her brooding silence.

"Frankie is keeping Jo Friday for a couple of days," she offered, before Jane could think of that as an excuse. Jane nodded without speaking, and Maura felt the anxiety constricting her chest, as unyielding as iron bands. She hadn't needed Korsak to tell her that the next few hours were likely going to determine the fate of their friendship, and she was suddenly terrified that she would discover that there was no friendship left to save.

Jane followed her inside, toeing her sneakers off in the entry hall with the absentminded ease of long habit. "I'm guessing that a beer is out of the question," she said as she made her way into the living room, fingers already probing gingerly at the edge of the bandage.

Ignoring the impulse to give her whatever she wanted, Maura shook her head. "Alcohol's depressant effects are contraindicated in the case of concussions, as are narcotic painkillers. Dr. Paulson did say that you could take either naproxen or acetominophen."

Jane snorted her disdain, her features set in stone, even when she winced from the movement. "Might as well piss on a bonfire," she muttered. "I'm just gonna go to bed, then. Or did you throw out my spare clothes?"

The dull, disinterested note of the query hurt worse than the sharper barbs they'd exchanged over the past two weeks. "No, they're still in the dresser in your room." She'd stopped thinking of it as the guest room long ago. It was Jane's room, and she could no more have discarded the clothes that the detective had left there, the toothbrush and hairbrush stashed in the downstairs bathroom, than she would have marched into Jane's apartment and started throwing things out.

"Thanks." The single word was flat, devoid of effect, and Jane hadn't looked directly at her since they'd come in. She started toward the bedroom, and Maura felt a renewed prickling of fear. She had to say something, had to make it right.

"Jane, wait. I -"

"I tried, Maura." Jane had stopped, her head down and her shoulders drooping in defeat, hands curled into fists at her sides. "I swear, I tried." No longer emotionless, her voice cracked and wavered on the edge of control. "I didn't want to kill that kid. I don't...go out looking for people to shoot. He had a gun, and I just...I tried."

Maura felt her heart breaking. The words, the tone of ragged despair, the defeated posture: Jane was blaming herself for the suspect's death. Worse, she clearly thought that Maura would blame her, as well.

_I don't play judge and jury and kill people!_

Words could wound; she'd had firsthand experience with that in her own life, and still she had hurled those spiteful words, _knowing_ they would hurt Jane, _wanting_ her to hurt as badly as Maura was hurting at that moment, wanting to punish her. Had she been so stupid as to have actually believed what she'd said, after seeing firsthand what police officers faced every day? Did it matter, when Jane obviously thought that she _did_ believe it? Those words had nearly gotten her best friend killed today, and they were still hurting her, even now.

She'd been mentally rehearsing for days just what she would say: to explain, to apologize, to ask for forgiveness, but the words were locked up in her throat, tangled up in emotions no less tumultuous than they had been the day Doyle was shot, and she was terrified that she would fumble, say the wrong thing again, and that would be the end of it. "Jane, please, I didn't-"

"I'm tired." Jane cut her off again, her voice once more flat and devoid of effect, the door slamming shut as suddenly as it had opened. "I need to sleep."

She went into her room and closed the door without looking back.


	5. Chapter 5

_Author's Note: All right, a near-unheard of event in Snafu-land: another chapter within 24 hours. Blame Jane and Maura for not letting me alone until I had it done, but it still would not have been possible without the holiday weekend._

_Don't look for a repeat any time soon. I've got a couple of chapters of my DA fics to work on, but we're definitely only a chapter or two from the end of this one, and then I can get 'Sins of The Fathers' back into play._

_Thanks as always to all who have read and reviewed, faved and followed, and as always, check out Chapter 1 for the disclaimer!_

* * *

She had lied.

Unlike Maura Isles, Jane Rizzoli could do that. She'd changed into her Red Sox jersey and shorts, and stretched out on the bed, staring at the ceiling, but while she was tired – fucking _exhausted_, mentally, physically and emotionally – she was not going to be sleeping any time soon.

Not because of the throbbing pain in her head, either. That kind of pain she had long ago learned how to ignore, work through, even feed off of. Her senior year in high school, she had skated in the hockey finals with a chipped ankle and scored three goals. She'd tackled a perp twice her size last year _after_ the bastard had broken two of her ribs with a crowbar, so freaking pumped on adrenaline she'd likely not have noticed if she was missing a limb.

For the last two weeks, she'd been dealing with an entirely different kind of pain: one that she had no tolerance for, could not escape, one that adrenaline could not drown out. It was the kind of hurt that she imagined animals in traps gnawing off legs to escape. There was no chewing off this source of pain, though. No way to escape the memory of the way that Maura had looked at her: betrayal, anger, loathing...as though _she_ were the enemy.

She had done what she had to do, damn it. She would happily have kicked Gabriel Dean's ass for showing up after he'd promised he'd hold back, would have kicked her own ass for being fool enough to trust him, when she knew that he was just as much a slave to duty as she was...or had been. Over the past two years, she'd bent rules and outright broken laws to protect Maura, but with or without Dean, Patrick Doyle's fate had been sealed the moment he'd shot Kevin Flynn. No way in hell could she have let him walk away; if it had just been her ass on the line, maybe, but Frost and Korsak had known, too...known and kept Maura's secret for close to two years. The three of them were accessories to Tommy O'Rourke's murder at Doyle's hands, though not a word of it had passed between them in the time since. Letting Doyle go would have finished them all; she couldn't have let that happen.

And once Doyle had shot Dean, turned his gun toward Frost, that had sealed it. He was no longer a father protecting his daughter, but a career criminal ready to shoot a cop. She had not hesitated then, though she _had_ taken the chance on not aiming for center-of-mass, but lower on the left side of his abdomen, trusting the power of the .45 hollow-point to take him down. For Maura. She hadn't been counting on him breaking through the catwalk railing and plunging to the floor, but those were the risks you took when you shot it out with the police.

Only Maura hadn't seen it that way, and even though Doyle was still alive (likely in a wheelchair for the rest of his life, but alive), the last words that Maura had hurled at her had left her reeling.

_At least I don't play judge and jury and kill people!_

She'd thought – _hoped_ – that Maura had just been referring to Doyle, but even after it became apparent that the mobster would survive, her former friend still looked at her the same way: like a murderer. Like she'd never really seen Jane Rizzoli before, and didn't care to see her again.

Fuck, it hurt. She had killed before. More than once. More than twice. Eight, by her last count, not including those she had wounded, which didn't increase the number much, because she shot to kill, and with few exceptions, she hit what she aimed at. More than enough to make IAB look askance, but every single review had ruled her shootings clean, justified. She was a trouble magnet, and a crack marksman, willing to take shots that other cops might hesitate at. But she could still name every perp she'd killed, still recall their faces and recite the details that had led to each shooting. Some had caused her no remorse at all, but others had left her agonizing for hours, _days_, going over each second leading up to her finger on the trigger, trying to figure out if there had been another way. Over the last three years, Maura had been with her during many of those soul searching times, guiding her through with gentle but irrefutable logic, proving each time that the outcome that had been reached had been the only one possible, given the unique set of circumstances that had combined in that situation.

But that had apparently changed. Now she was a murderer: judge, jury and executioner, and Maura no longer looked at her with friendship, trust, admiration, affectionate exasperation or those occasional flashes of almost childlike wonder. She looked at her like she was something repugnant, repulsive: a killer.

And it was tearing Jane apart.

She'd spent the last two weeks trying grimly to convince herself that she could do both: be a good cop and be the person that her best friend wanted her to be. Shoot the guns out of the bad guys' hands and arrest them. No more killing, no more aiming for center-of-mass.

Today had shown that notion for the fool's dream it had been. That wild shot could have easily taken out Frost, Korsak, some civilian on the sidelines. She couldn't be a cop and not be willing to shoot to kill when she knew it was called for. And if she wasn't a cop, what in the hell was she?

She'd never wanted to be anything else, not really (the ballerina dream hadn't survived her first glimpse of the torture devices known as toe-shoes, and goalie for the Bruins? She was good, but she hadn't been that good). She _was_ a cop. It defined her, drove her, made her who she was. How many relationships with men had ended when it became a choice of them or the badge? She'd chosen the badge every time without hesitation, and if she could not say there had been no regrets, she could live with them.

The choice was being forced again, this time from a direction that she'd never expected. Maura wasn't some guy she'd dated a few times and could part with without feeling that she was giving up much; she was the friend that Jane had never expected to have, the one she could tell anything to, the one she didn't have to hide anything from. Her doubts, her fears, the fact that _occasionally_, she didn't mind putting on a dress and actually looking like a girl. She had been able to be herself with Maura, whoever that happened to be at the time, and Maura had accepted her. Until now.

She couldn't find it in herself to blame Maura. She'd wondered years ago how the gentle, cultured and naïve scientist had wound up in a line of work where life's ugliest realities slithered around your ankles every single day; she'd wondered how long the M.E. could possibly last, but against all odds, Maura Isles had not only lasted, but maintained that innocence that both confounded Jane and left her with an overwhelming urge to protect and preserve it. Paddy Doyle, damn his soul, had tainted that innocence, dragged Maura headlong into his life, tried to enlist her in O'Rourke's murder, but now it was Jane who was the threat.

She'd been tainted for years; maybe even before Hoyt got his hands on her, but surely after. You couldn't swim in sewage and not pick up the stink. She couldn't let that taint hurt Maura more than it already had. She was a cop, but she couldn't _be_ a cop, do the job that she needed to do, and still be what Maura wanted her to be. She wasn't a hero, or a saint. She was just a cop whose worst nightmare was watching someone innocent die because she hadn't been fast enough or good enough to stop it.

She was choosing the badge again, but the choice had never hurt like this, never scared her like this. Maura had become her link to humanity, normalcy, sanity. Without her, she would become nothing but the badge; the taint that slithered around her ankles now would rise unchecked, seeping into her pores until the killing no longer gave her any pause; until the hate for the injustice, cruelty and outright evil that she saw every day consumed her; until maybe a kickback from a piece of shit like Doyle would feel like nothing more than what she deserved for fighting a war that would never end.

She could feel now – just barely – what Bobby Marino must have felt when he agreed to help move those drugs...and that scared the hell out of her. She'd eat her gun before she let herself get to that point.

She swung out of the bed, grunting at the brief lance of pain before it settled back into the steady throb. She really wanted a beer, and the darkness from the living room meant that Maura had gone to bed and wouldn't be there to stop her. Seriously, what could one beer hurt, and what did it matter if it did? She wondered if this black mood was a side effect of the concussion. Maura would know, but she wasn't about to wake her up to ask.

Leaving the lights out, she wandered out into the living room, the darkness soothing her eyes, matching her mood. Bass was snoozing in his usual nighttime spot, so she didn't have to worry about tripping over him. She started for the refrigerator, hesitated, then moved to the foot of the stairs, drawn by something that she couldn't name. If Maura was still awake, if she heard her moving downstairs, came down and caught her with a beer, there would be another argument, and Jane wasn't up to that.

She ascended slowly, her head pounding with each step, listening for sounds of activity. No light shone from beneath Maura's bedroom door, but she could hear _something_, so she kept moving forward, step by silent step, until she stood right outside the door, closing her eyes as she recognized the sound of Maura's muffled sobs.

* * *

Crying alone was something that Maura had been accustomed to for most of her life. Her parents had been unsure how to deal with her tears, offering well-meant advice about stiff upper lips and the dignity expected of a well-bred young woman. Her classmates...well, most often, they had been the cause of her tears, and had been only too pleased to observe the success of their efforts.

Holding back her tears until she was unobserved had been both victory and defeat, a needed release that had made her feel ashamed, weak, unworthy, and every bit the misfit and outcast that the others treated her like.

Then, for a brief, miraculous time, there had been someone willing to stay with her when she cried without judging, without reproving, without laughing. Sometimes hugging her until the tears passed, sometimes trying to cajole her out of them with humor, other times simply sitting close and passing her tissues, but always there when Maura had needed her. Without question, without hesitation, without exception.

Now she was back to crying alone, and she had only herself to blame. She wrapped her arms around the pillow, buried her face in it to muffle the sounds, because she didn't want Jane to hear her. She was going to have to get herself under control soon, because she would need to go downstairs to check Jane's level of responsiveness, but she wasn't sure how she was going to do it, because the well of grief she had tapped seemed bottomless.

She didn't hear the door ease open, didn't hear the careful footsteps approaching on the carpeted floor.

"This can't go on, Maur." Jane's voice, soft and close.

She opened her eyes to find the detective crouched beside the bed, dark eyes watching her; the anger and hostility were gone, replaced by a piercing, tender sorrow that sent an answering lance of pain through Maura's heart.

"I can't keep hurting you like this."

The sheer unexpectedness of the words caused a break in the tears as she stared at Jane. Jane...hurting _her_? "I don't -"

"It's all right." The sad smile that Jane gave her scared her more than the detective's anger. "You are who you are, and I am who I am, and that can't change. I just...need to leave. I'll catch a cab back to the hospital, wait until Dr. Paulson says I'm good to go. At work...I dunno. We have to work with each other, but I'll keep it professional, I promise -"

"No!" Maura had heard nothing after the word 'leave'. Panic churned up through the grief, and she reached out blindly to Jane. "No, don't go -" She felt herself tip over the edge of the mattress, there was the brief sensation of falling, but then Jane caught her with a grunted "Shit!", strong arms holding her protectively, and she wrapped her arms around the detective, clinging as tightly as she had held onto the pillow, burying her face against the softness of the worn cotton jersey as Jane let them both settle to the floor. "Don't go!" she sobbed. "Please, I'm sorry! Don't go! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" She couldn't stop saying it, couldn't stop crying, couldn't let go of what felt like a lifeline.

"It's all right, it's all right," Jane kept repeating, rocking her back and forth, one hand stroking her hair, the other arm holding her snugly, and for the first time in two weeks, she felt safe. Regardless of her muddled emotions for Patrick Doyle, there had always been fear when she was around him. Not with Jane. She'd never been afraid of Jane. "I won't go, all right?"

"Promise!" she insisted, her hands fisting in the material of the jersey. "Pr-promise you won't leave me!" Jane had never broken a promise to Maura. Never. "Promise!"

"I promise! I promise, all right?" The words eased the press of panic, but she couldn't seem to stop crying, sobbing out her broken apology over and over. "It's all right, Maur." Jane was starting to sound alarmed, the circle of her arms tightening. "I'm here, I'm not going anywhere. It's all right."

"No, it's not!" she sobbed, shaking her head. "I have to tell you...I ha-have to tell -" The words that she needed to say were there, but the tears wouldn't let them come out.

"No. You don't." Jane's voice grew suddenly soft, sure. "Not right now, because that's not what matters. _This_ matters." The feel of her arms drawing Maura even closer, the brush of her cheek against Maura's, their tears mingling before lips pressed a gentle kiss to her temple. "This is all that matters, Maur, and I'm not leaving. I can't." Her voice cracked on the last two words.

The tight bands that had been constricting her chest for what felt like forever loosened, and the tears that fell now were different, cleansing and welcome. "I missed you," she whispered, resting her head on Jane's shoulder, relishing the warmth of the embrace, the beat of the detective's heart.

"I missed you, too." Jane's voice was rough with tears. "And I'm sorry, too. Maur. So damn sorry."

"Hssh." Jane had nothing to be sorry for, but now was not the time to get into that. "We'll talk in the morning. Right now...just this." She closed her eyes, leaning further into the embrace. "Please?"

She felt Jane nod, the brush of hair against her face. "Sounds good," the detective agreed, but Maura could feel the bits of blood still caught in the fine strands, and she sat up suddenly.

"Your head!" She caught Jane's tear-damp face in her hands and turned her head to examine the bandage, alarmed at the sight of a trace of blood seeping through. "How is it? Do we need to change the bandage?"

"Not until morning," Jane assured her with a hint of her old smartass smile, "and while, oddly enough, it hurts like hell, it's not too bad otherwise. The doc said they put a drain along the path; something about the bullet dragging junk beneath the skin. They spent like an hour flushing saline through it."

Maura nodded. "Bullet tracks can be very contaminated: hair, dirt, feces -"

"Okay. Point taken." Jane held up a hand, regarding her plaintively. "Can we hold off on that until tomorrow, too, along with any lectures on stupid cop tricks, please?"

"Well..." Maura cocked her head, pretending to consider while she performed a swift evaluation of Jane's condition. Her speech was clear, with no signs of disorientation; the fact that she'd caught Maura before she could hit the floor would indicate that physical coordination was unimpaired, and the amount of blood visible was commensurate with the presence of a simple Penrose drain that would be removed in a day or two, once the possibility of infection was past. "All right."

"Gee, thanks," Jane said dryly as Maura wrapped her arms back around her with a contented sigh. She shifted suddenly, and Maura stiffened as she realized that the detective was trying to stand.

"Jane -"

"Maura, while I have no doubt that your floor, with its Armenian wool-blend, deep pile carpet is more comfortable than _my_ bed, I know damn good and well that it's not more comfortable than _your_ bed...at least, it had better not be after what you paid for that mattress and sheets." Jane stood, her hands in Maura's drawing the doctor up with her. "And since I think that I might actually manage to sleep now, I might as well be comfortable, and so should you."

"Oh. That does make sense." Still, while she crawled back into her recently-abandoned side of the bed, she didn't fully relax until Jane had moved to the other side and slipped beneath the covers, and once the detective had settled, Maura closed the distance between them, snuggling up and wrapping her arms around the lanky frame once more. "Is this all right?" she asked uncertainly, keeping her face hidden against Jane's shoulder. She felt like a child afraid of the dark, clinging tight to an older sibling, and she worried that Jane would find her neediness foolish.

"It's fine," Jane assured her with a yawn, turning on her side to return the embrace, her arm draping over Maura's waist, her cheek resting against the doctor's hair. She was asleep within minutes.

She should set an alarm on her cell phone, Maura told herself. Something to remind her to check Jane's condition in an hour, but she didn't want to disturb her friend's slumber just yet, and she couldn't seem to make herself move. Soothed further by the steady rhythm of her friend's heart and breathing, she followed her quickly into a deep and dreamless sleep.

* * *

_A.N. - Yes, The Talk is coming next chapter, but as Jane was smart enough to realize, this was the bridge that needed mending first._


	6. Chapter 6

_Author's Note: One more chapter after this one. My thanks again to all who have read/reviewed/faved/followed!_

* * *

"Francesco Donatello Rizzoli, Jr.! _Why_ did I hear about my daughter getting_ shot _by a phone call from Lorraine Tucci?"

All three names was never a good thing, and it was a general consensus among the Rizzoli siblings that middle names had been selected with the express purpose of making their owners never want to do anything to hear them in public (though in Frankie's case, it would have been Grandma Rizzoli that did the choosing). Frankie had slipped up at a Little League game in the fifth grade, and had spent the next seven years being called 'Turtle Boy". Which, all things considered, was better than eight years of off-key choruses of 'My Darling Clementine' from Joey Grant and his pals. And a hell of a lot better than what Tommy got stuck with. Just his rotten luck that Ma had been on a John Wayne kick when he'd been born.

Frankie held the phone an inch or two away from his ear, wincing. His first mistake had been giving in to his sister's demand that he not call their mother. His second mistake had been answering the phone when it rang at 7am, but the only prospect worse than facing Angela Rizzoli's wrath over the phone was facing it in person, which was exactly what he'd wind up doing sooner, rather than later, if he didn't pick up.

"Where are you, Ma?" he asked, settling the phone back into place, praying she hadn't caught a flight back as soon as she hung up with Lorraine.

"Where _am_ I? I'm in _Philadelphia_, where I got woken up at the crack of dawn by Lorraine telling me that my daughter is on the news for getting shot! _Again_! I'm packing my bags, and you are gonna pick me up at the train station this afternoon, mister!"

"Ma, no." He was so screwed. "Ma, I'm sorry I didn't call, but Janie's fine, and she didn't want to ruin your visit with Aunt Marie. She's not even in the hospital; they released her last night -"

"Against doctor's orders, I'll bet!" Angela snapped, unmollified. "You know your sister, she could be bleeding to death from a severed limb, and she'd still say she was fine! Please tell me you didn't leave her alone last night!"

"No!" He wasn't that stupid. If it had come to it, he'd have manned up and spent the night getting bitched at every hour when he woke his sister up, but fortunately, he hadn't had to. "She's staying with Maura. She's got a doctor looking after her, so -"

"Maura?" Angela exclaimed. "They're friends again?"

"Not...exactly, Ma." However, Frankie thought he could see a glimmer of hope. "But Korsak said that Maura was gonna talk to her, try to work things out-"

"Oh, thank God!" The gunshot wound had just been demoted to a secondary consideration. _Good move, Frankie._ "They've both been so stubborn! They'll work it out, won't they, Frankie?"

"That's what we're hoping, Ma." He didn't want to get her hopes up too much, because he knew there was more to her question than wanting to be able to move back into Maura's guest house. The last two weeks had been like walking on eggshells filled with nitroglycerine, and the fact that he hadn't received an overnight call from Jane demanding to be picked up was a good sign, since he also hadn't heard of any mushroom clouds springing up over Beacon Hill. "We were just gonna leave them alone for a day or so, give them time..." He trailed off, hoping like hell she'd pick it up.

She did. "Of course, of course! I'll just stay here and come back Sunday like I planned, but you call me if you hear _anything_, you understand me?"

"Yeah, Ma, I understand. I promise." He sank back onto his pillow, mouthing a heartfelt _'Thank you!'_ heavenward. "I'll pick you up at the station. Seven o'clock, right?" Jane had originally been slated for pick-up duty, but he figured it was on his plate now.

"Seven o'clock," Angela confirmed, "and if you talk to your sister, tell her I love her!"

"I will, Ma. Love you." He hung up and closed his eyes. He wasn't fool enough to think he'd heard the last of it, but he'd just bought himself a two-day reprieve, and he intended to start making the most of it by sleeping until noon.

Tags jingled, a soft weight landed on his bed, and a soft whine was followed by a cold nose in his ear, and paws shifting on the comforter in what was unmistakably a canine version of the 'Gotta-go' dance.

"Aw, Jo, please!"

* * *

Maura awoke feeling well rested, but with a nagging feeling of something left undone. She lay still, letting the last haze of sleep dissipate, analyzing the feeling. She had slept better than she had since before the shooting, since her mother had nearly died saving her life. She had slept well because of -

_Jane!_

Her eyes flew open, and she sat upright as it hit her. She was supposed to have woken Jane up every hour to check her level of responsiveness! The place in the bed beside her was empty, but a reddish-brown stain on the pillow Jane had been using made her heart clench in fear.

"Jane?" She scrambled to the far side of the bed, morbidly certain that she would find her friend sprawled on the floor, comatose or worse, but the floor was as unoccupied as the bed. "_Jane!_"

"In here." Jane's voice from her bathroom, and relief flooded Maura, though it couldn't drown out the clamor of guilt at failing in her duty to her friend. She'd been released from the hospital into Maura's care, and anything could have happened while she slept carelessly on. She made her way to the bathroom, peered around the door.

"Oh, my God." Jane had taken off her bandage and was scowling at her reflection in disgust, fingers probing gingerly at the protruding Penrose drain, but that was not what had prompted Maura's exclamation. The bruising had matured to full bloom, and the upper left quadrant of Jane's face was a mottled mess of black, purple and green, the starburst hemorrhage a bright red against the white of her sclera.

The detective shot her a sideways glance. "Looks worse than it feels," she offered, one side of her mouth lifting in a lopsided grin, "but Frankie's not gonna be topping this any time soon."

"I would hope he wouldn't try." Maura kept the reproof in her voice as careful as she could. Jane and her brother had been comparing 'battle scars' for most of their lives, and it had quite naturally flowed into a competition in the workplace, with Frost as a new participant.

The grin turned a bit sheepish. "Yeah," Jane agreed softly, turning back to the mirror with a grimace. "_This_, however," she announced, pointing at the drain, "is just plain gross. And there's another one back here." Her hand went behind her left ear. "Aw, crap! How am I supposed to shower with this?"

"You don't," Maura informed her. "Not until they remove the drain, and it's just a single length of tubing, running the length of the bullet track -"

"Okay, more than I needed to know." Jane held up a hand with a pained look. "But...no shower? For how long? I've got blood in my hair, damn it!"

"Usually only a day or two, if there's no sign of infection. May I?" She would never have felt the need to ask before, but she waited for Jane's nod to step closer, examining the entry and exit wounds, forcing her mind to think clinically, to not reflect on what an inch to the right might have meant. "The drainage is entirely serosanguinous, with no signs of purulence," she announced, stepping back with a pleased smile.

Dark eyes followed her expectantly. "And that means..." Jane trailed off, waiting.

"No sign of infection," Maura translated. "Take the antibiotics that Dr. Paulson prescribed, keep it clean, and I'd imagine that they'll remove the drain in a day or two and leave it to finish healing. I could -" She hesitated, went on. "I could clean it for you, if you'd like. It's in an awkward spot to do yourself."

Jane's eyes met hers, testing the fragile truce, the light of day plainly leaving her feeling just as exposed as it was Maura, after last night's breakdown. "Please," the detective said at last, settling on the edge of the tub.

The task was a simple one, medically speaking, but she could feel the faint tremor in her hands as she cleaned away the drainage with a povidone scrub, rinsed the area with sterile saline, applied an antibiotic, feeling the skull just beneath her fingers as she worked. Not even an inch. Half an inch, or if her head had been turned just a few degrees to the right... "How is your headache?" she asked, trying not to think about how fragile the human skull could be, how the thinnest part was the temporal bone: the temple, directly below the entry wound.

"Well, it's improved, which means that it only feels like a tactical nuke went off behind my eyes," Jane quipped sardonically. "Definitely better, though."

"Your pupils are equal," Maura commented, peering into the brown eyes, "and appropriately constricted for the level of light. Any dizziness, blurry vision?"

"Nope." Jane shook her head, winced.

"I should have woken you up every hour last night to check your condition," Maura admitted. "I'm sorry."

The dark eyes flickered upward to her, one eyebrow arching. "And I was so looking forward to the broken sleep," she replied wryly. "Since I seem to have survived – and I'm thinking that my head wouldn't hurt like this if I was dead – I won't tell if you won't."

Maura watched her, relief warring with worry. "You were very lucky," she said softly.

Jane shook her head again, her features shifting into a stone mask and her eyes shuttering. "I was stupid," she muttered, looking down. "Maura -"

"Are you hungry?" Maura cut her off before she could go further. "I know that we need to talk," she went on, seeing the frustration flash across the detective's features, "but I think that we'd both benefit from some breakfast. Low blood glucose can lead to suboptimal brain function and responses, and -" _And I don't want to mess this up._ She bit her lip, went on. "You can get a bath, at least, while I make us some breakfast."

"You don't have to -" Jane started to protest.

"I _want_ to," Maura corrected her firmly, forcing herself to meet the detective's gaze until she nodded, "and we can talk, and after that, if you want, I can help you wash your hair at the kitchen sink, and we can get the bandage replaced."

Jane hesitated, then nodded again. "Breakfast sounds good," she agreed, skirting the rest of Maura's offer without comment. "Thanks. I won't take too long."

No demands for 'real' food, or warnings against egg white omelets. The bond between them that had felt so strong last night now felt as thin as a strand of spider's silk...but despite its fragile appearance, spider silk was, ounce for ounce, one of the strongest substances in the world, with remarkable tensile strength, hard to break.

Maura told herself this as she went downstairs, hearing the water begin to run into the tub overhead. Jane had not made any requests for breakfast, but Maura knew well enough what her friend liked, and while she hadn't actually looked at the shelves in her kitchen that were devoted to Jane's food preferences in a couple of weeks, as with the detective's clothes and toiletries, she hadn't even considered throwing them out, beyond the items whose shelf life had expired.

Coffee first: Jane liked the product of the French press, but hated the wait, so Maura set it up to brew a pot of decaf before turning her attention to the rest of the meal. The milk had expired last week, and Jane would not eat Cocoa Puffs with soy milk, but after her injury, something more substantial was indicated, anyway. After a brief debate, she decided on whole-grain waffles with butter and maple syrup, eggs over medium, turkey sausage and fresh fruit. Despite Jane's words about a quick bath, the food was set out on the kitchen island and Maura had just begun to worry about it getting cold when the detective came downstairs dressed in sweats and a t-shirt, with a clumsy attempt at a bandage around her head making the reason for the delay clear. Her eyes lit up at the sight of the food, then narrowed warily.

"This looks suspiciously like a last meal. Something you need to tell me?" Maura shook her head. "Injuries draw on the body's reserves to heal, so proper nutrition is vital during the process, and the food actually is quite healthy, all appearances to the contrary. The waffles, for example, are made with a ten-grain flour that is high in fiber and B-vitamins, while the sausage -"

"- is meat," Jane finished for her, settling in her chair, casting a curious glance at Maura's plate. "And if it's not, I don't want to know. No yogurt and granola?"

"This actually sounded good," Maura replied, sitting down in front of her own plate, which was identical to Jane's, except that her eggs had been poached, rather than fried. There was more to it than that. She had long known of the vital social functions that the sharing of food fulfilled, but until she had become a regular attender of the Rizzoli Sunday dinners, she had never really experienced for herself the bonding that occurred when a tightly knit group of people sat around a table of food that they all enjoyed, the presence of each other as vital a sustenance as the meal. She took pride in her culinary skills, but she doubted that she would ever equal Angela in the creation of comfort food; it was Jane's mother who had shown her that cooking could be another way of nurturing, of showing love without words.

But it _did_ taste good. She had not eaten much in the last two weeks; her choices had been nutritionally sound, consumed as part of her duty to maintain functional efficiency, but barely noted as to flavor.

Jane groaned, and Maura looked up in concern. "Butter _and_ maple syrup?" the detective mumbled around a mouthful of waffles. "I gotta get shot more often."

"No." The word escaped before Maura could catch herself. "Not even as a joke," she added softly as the dark eyes lifted to her in puzzlement. "Please?"

Jane nodded, swallowed. "Sorry," she offered uncertainly, where before she would have probably rolled her eyes, scoffed, reminded Maura that she already had a mother. Maura wanted to apologize, but the return of the tightness in her chest wouldn't let her. Would they ever be able to get back to the effortless friendship they had once shared, or was it too late?

A few more bites were taken in silence before Jane spoke again. "How's your mom doing?"

"Better." Maura managed a smile despite the ache that Jane's careful query caused. "She's been moved to a private rehabilitation center in New York."

Jane scowled slightly at this, but nodded. With the firestorm of publicity that had swirled up after Doyle's shooting, Boston would not have offered a peaceful environment for Constance Isles' recovery. "You should take some personal time, be with her."

Maura shook her head. "She's fine. We talk on the phone every day." That alone was a significant change in their relationship, and yet another that she could thank Jane for. Her mother's injury had brought them closer together, but it was a process that had begun with Jane giving her a blunt assessment of her shortcomings as a mother: an assessment that Constance had evidently taken to heart. "She has many friends in New York who are quite supportive."

Jane nodded. "Yeah, friends are...good." She ducked her head back to her breakfast, ate some more. "And Hope?" She glanced up, meeting Maura's eyes cautiously. "Have you found out anything else?"

"I haven't tried," Maura admitted. "I haven't been back to see him since you showed me the grave." _Her_ grave. Maura Doyle. Just looking at the name carved in granite had made chills chase down her spine, but beneath that had been the heartwrenching realization that the woman who had given birth to her was not looking for her, wondering about her. She thought the daughter she'd given birth to was dead. Seeking her out would almost certainly turn her world upside down.

Jane digested this, chewing slowly, emotions flickering across her features. "We can find her, Maura," she offered at last. "We've got a first name, the date of birth, the general location. If it's in a computer, Frost can pull it out, and Korsak and I can check the leads, make sure they're solid before you try to contact her."

She didn't suggest that Maura speak to Doyle again, try to build a connection with her biological father, and she wouldn't. Jane Rizzoli and Patrick Doyle were two sides of a coin, more alike than either of them would likely care to realize, and they both saw things in stark black and white, the codes they lived by almost negative images of each other, and equally uncompromising.

"I don't know that I'm ready for that," she said with a shake of her head, setting her fork aside. Half her breakfast remained uneaten, but the knot in her stomach would not let her eat more. "I'm not sure I'll ever be ready. But thank you."

Jane's brow furrowed in concern as she regarded Maura's unfinished food, and she seemed on the verge of pushing her own plate away before visibly reconsidering and digging back in with dogged determination.

_She's doing it for me. She doesn't want to upset me._ The realization prompted Maura to reclaim her own fork and take careful bites of her waffles, willing her rebellious digestive tract to cooperate, which it did at last, allowing her to finish her breakfast alongside Jane in silence, the only sound the soft clink of the silverware against the porcelain.

The detective helped her clear the dishes from the island, but Maura stopped her when she started to open the dishwasher. "That can wait," she said quietly. Jane met her eyes briefly, nodded and returned to her chair, refilling her coffee mug and wrapping her hands around it, her shoulders tight. Maura settled back in her own chair, respecting Jane's unspoken choice to keep the island between them, and refreshed her own coffee, busying herself with adding cream and sugar as she tried to order her thoughts. She had spoken at medical conventions, to audiences numbering in the hundreds, but those speeches had involved medicine, science, _facts_: all of the things that she had turned to precisely because she seemed unable to navigate the seemingly unfathomable and treacherous waters of human relationships.

"What I'm going to say...just please hear me out before you say anything," she began, weighing each word as carefully as she would a victim's organs during an autopsy. "I'm probably going to make a mess of it, but if I can make nothing else clear, I need this to be: the things I said to you that day at the warehouse, I had no right to say, and I have never in my life said anything more wrong.

"Don't. Please?" she asked when Jane opened her mouth. She was forcing herself into her clinical mode, because that was the only way she was going to get through this without breaking into tears again. She could barely even look at Jane: the massive bruises, the hemorrhage on the eye, the bandage that hid the gunshot wound that could so easily have killed her...because of Maura. She kept her gaze slightly downcast, letting her peripheral vision register Jane's nod of agreement before continuing, her hands wrapped tight around her coffee mug to keep them from shaking. "After we found out that Patrick Doyle was my father, I should have immediately reported that knowledge to my superiors. It was wrong of me to let you – any of you – be burdened with that secret, but I'm not used to people being willing to take chances like that for me, and Doyle -" she broke off, struggling. This was still the greatest point of internal conflict, the noisy collision of intellect and emotion threatening her coherence.

"He's a criminal, a murderer, regardless of what he says about his code of honor...but he was there when I was growing up, even when I didn't see him. He frightens me. The thought that I could be like him frightens me, but I'm drawn to him, as well, and not just because he knows who my biological mother is. I can't seem to turn off that emotion, and that frightens me, too. Is it love? I don't know. It doesn't make sense; I barely know him, and what I do know about him strongly suggests that he is not an appropriate father-figure, but that doesn't seem to matter. He came to that warehouse to protect me, and lost his freedom, and very nearly his life, to do it. Even though I know that he was a wanted criminal, I still feel guilty that I was the reason he was apprehended. It's all...confused, muddled, chaotic...everything that I've tried to avoid in my life. I don't really know what it is I feel for him, what he is to me, and I let that confusion, that chaos, cloud my judgment in other areas, and I shouldn't have, because I _know_ without any doubt who _you_ are to me and what I feel for you."

She lifted her head, forcing herself to meet Jane's eyes, forcing her voice to remain level. "You are the best friend I have ever had, and I love you. You accepted me, supported me, protected me. You've been there for me like no one in my life ever has, and you gave me the family that I always wanted: you, your mother and brothers, Vince, Barry. For the first time in my life, I felt like I belonged somewhere, and I threw that away because of an irrational emotional yearning from my childhood. It was the biggest mistake I ever made in my life, but I have to live with the consequences of my own actions, even if that means I've destroyed our friendship. If...if I have, I still need you to know that I am sorry, and I desperately need you to know that you are _not_ a killer. When you shot Doyle, you were doing just what you should have done, and I never should have suggested otherwise. You put your life at risk every time you go to work, you are forced to make life and death decisions in the blink of an eye, and the only ones who have any right to question those decisions are the ones who have made them, too. Not some sheltered, ivory-tower wheelchair-quarterback who has never had to make a split-second decision in her life."

She stopped, drawing a deep breath. Jane's dark eyes were swimming with tears, and her own were entirely too close, but she wasn't done yet, and she had to get it all out. "You're one of the good guys, Jane. You're a hero. You're _my_ hero; you have been since the day we met, and you always will be, and I am so, _so_ sorry that I ever said anything to make you doubt that." Her voice finally broke on the last words, and she ducked her head, fighting the tears.

"Maura." Jane's voice, thick with emotion, and when the doctor didn't respond, her hand stretched across the space between them, curling around one of Maura's, prying it gently away from the coffee mug and lacing their fingers together. "Maura, look at me."

She lifted her eyes slowly, relief at having managed to get it all out warring with the fear that anything the detective might say would be prompted more by pity than anything else. Having Jane feel sorry for her would be almost as bad as having Jane hate her. "Jane, I -"

"Nope, you've had your say. It's my turn now." The careful tone was gone, and the bluntness was so blessedly familiar and free of anything remotely resembling pity that Maura felt the flutter of apprehension in her chest still somewhat, giving her the courage to raise her head the last few inches to meet Jane's gaze.

"He's your father, Maura," Jane said softly. "There's nothing logical or rational about family. My old man is turning out to be a piece of shit, and most days I want to kick his ass and scream at him, but there's still a part of me that just wants him to hug me and tell me everything's gonna be okay, and believe that it will be, just because he said so.

"You should never have been in that warehouse," Jane went on. "We knew that the perp was trying to kill you, and we sent you in there as fucking bait." She shook her head, her features tight with anger. "I should have expected Flynn to come armed, and I should have expected Doyle to show up...and I should have fucking known that Dean wouldn't pass up the chance to bag Doyle."

"I never expected -" Maura started to protest, but Jane shook her head again, harder this time.

"You trust people, Maura. I don't. I know what people are capable of. Once Doyle shot Flynn, I didn't have any choice but to do what I did, but it never should have gotten to that point, because I should have known better. I put your life at risk to make a bust, and I wound up forcing you to feel you had to choose between your father and me, and I should never have done either one. I'm sorry." She dropped her head miserably, trying to draw her hand back, but Maura held on. "I can't even tell you that I'm sorry I shot your father," she whispered, her free hand curled into a white-knuckled fist, the words tumbling over each other, "because if the situation were the same, I'd do it again, except now I'd shoot to kill, because if Doyle had done what Hightower did, anything could have happened. He could have hit Frost, or you, and that would have been my fault! I could live with you hating me, but I don't think I could handle it if I got you killed. You are my best friend, and I love you. You're _family_, damn it, and I'm sorry that I ever said otherwise, but I'm a cop, and I can't just pick and choose when I'm going to be a cop, because then I really would be playing judge and jury, and that's _wrong_, damn it, and I can't – I can't -" Her fist slammed down against the top of the island, and she sat up, frustration and fear flaring in her eyes as she kept fighting to force the words out.

"It's all right." Maura slid from her chair and moved around the island, wrapping her arms around Jane, feeling the tremors rolling through the detective's frame as she pressed her head against the doctor's shoulder, the tumble of dark curls hiding her face and the tears that were falling. Agitation and reduced mental acuity were frequent sequellae of concussions. Perhaps this hadn't been the best time to attempt a discussion of this emotional magnitude, but it was done, and she could do nothing now but try to ease her friend past the tumult that was gripping her, as Jane had done for her last night. "It's all right, Jane. I don't hate you, and I don't want you to pick and choose. I don't want you to be anything but what you are. It's all right." She kept repeating it, stroking Jane's hair and rocking slowly, until the trembling eased and the ragged sobs tapered off.

Jane sat up, her face paler than Maura would have liked and drawn in a way that the M.E. knew meant that she was in physical pain, but the deepest of the distress had faded from her eyes. "So...we both screwed the pooch on this one, right?" she asked, biting lightly at her lower lip and her eyes not quite meeting Maura's.

The doctor nodded; the colloquialism was one that had utterly baffled her the first time she had heard it, but Jane used it with sufficient regularity that association had made the intended meaning apparent. "Yes, I believe that would be the most reasonable conclusion, based upon the evidence." In truth, she blamed herself for the whole debacle, but she knew that Jane would never accept that; she had slipped into her 'Google-mouth' tone quite deliberately, and was rewarded with a faint but genuine smile.

"Friends again?" Jane asked softly, looking almost shy, and she nodded again, relief flooding through her.

"Yes," she replied, throwing her arms around the detective, feeling Jane hugging her back. "Definitely yes." She drew back slightly, touching the edge of the lopsided and decidedly loose bandage. "How about we get your hair washed and I redo this, then watch some TV? I think I recorded a House marathon last weekend." The week's football games had probably been recorded, as well, but Jane got too worked up when watching sporting events.

"Sounds good," Jane nodded, adding quickly, "but no telling me why a diagnosis is wrong. And Maur?"

The tone was hesitant, but the familiar diminutive was one that only Jane used, and Maura paused on her way to the sink, glanced back to find her friend regarding her with the patient and affectionate half-smile that she knew well. "Yes?"

"It's 'armchair quarterback'," Jane corrected her.

"Oh." Maura blinked, dialing back in her memory to the term in question, feeling what was undoubtedly a goofy smile spreading across her face. She didn't care. "Got it. Thanks."

"Any time."


	7. Chapter 7

_Author's Note: Last Chapter! Thanks to all of you who have read, reviewed, followed & faved!_

* * *

_Three months later._

"Gentlemen, the opening bid for the next item is fifty thousand."

Jane, Korsak and Frost moved swift and silent down the hallway of the warehouse, guns drawn. The lone guard outside the elevator was stretched out on the floor, courtesy of Frost's sweet right cross, but they were all in the mood for violence.

Jane edged to the door, risking a quick peep through the curtain, but every eye in the room was turned to the girl who stood on the raised dais in the center: Leah Babic. The laughing girl who had posed in the photos with her sister had been replaced with a broken, fearful child who stood with shoulders hunched and head down. Helpless.

_Helpless._ Jane felt the throb of her pulse in her temples. She knew that feeling, courtesy of Hoyt, had been given a hellish refresher course by that sick fuck, Dominic two weeks ago, but she was not helpless now, by God. The weight of the gun in her hand felt like justice.

"Do I hear fifty thousand for this unspoiled virgin?" Leah cringed when Chris Harris – Cutthroat – touched her arm to turn her for better display, but she knew better than to pull away. She was defeated, resigned to her fate.

"Fifty," a stocky, bearded bastard grunted with no more emotion than if he'd been buying a car at an auction...or a broodmare.

A satisfied smile touched Harris' lying lips. "We have fifty, do I hear fifty-two? Fifty-two, now do I hear fifty-five?"

Enough. They'd heard more than enough. A quick nod from Jane and Frost hit the button on his radio that would brink Monroe and his team in like a pack of wolves. "Boston Police!" she shouted as the three of them burst through the door, guns leveled. "Nobody move!" Most of them, finding themselves suddenly demoted from predator to prey, did as they were told, eyes flickering in panicked calculation as they tried to come up with a way to spin the situation that wouldn't land them in jail or on the front page of tomorrow's paper.

Harris, however, grabbed Leah and yanked her from the dais, holding her in front of him, a wicked looking knife appearing in his right hand and hovering next to the girl's throat. The affable demeanor of a man running an altruistic enterprise was gone; his lips were curled into a a snarl of pure hate. "Come any closer and I cut this whore!"

"Like you cut her sister, Anja?" Rizzoli kept the pistol leveled, eyes calculating distance, trajectory. There were some perps she could find a measure of empathy for: the guy who'd started robbing banks as payback for a foreclosure; the fucked-up kid who'd started killing as a way to deal with his own father's murder of his mother. This piece of shit, though...there was no empathy, not even the temptation to try to establish a connection. There was only the relentless standoff as she waited for the shot to present itself.

Behind her, she heard the commotion as the human trafficking unit burst in to support Frost and Korsak, shouts of "Up against the wall!" and "Hands where I can see them!", but her own eyes and gun never wavered, waiting for the opening that she knew would come.

"Let me go!" Leah struggled in his grip. "Shut up!" he shouted, tightening his hold, well aware that killing her meant the loss of his one bargaining chip. She'd seen it time and again, from beginning to end, wondered what kind of fucking, egocentric sociopath could ever think that it would end differently for them.

"Shut...up!" he roared as Leah continued to kick and thrash, and now her head flung to the side, giving Jane the opening that she needed, the action unfolding in the space between heartbeats.

_One._

Her aim was already on target, and there was no hesitation. She squeezed the trigger, her grip controlling the recoil, and the slug took him in the center of his throat.

_Two._

The hand holding the knife dropped away like a marionette whose strings had been cut. The brutal grip on Leah also lessened, and she pulled away with a scream.

_Three._

The next two shots were textbook: center of mass as he swayed on his feet, sending him sprawling back onto the floor, the knife falling from lifeless fingers.

She kicked the knife away, bent down to confirm the absence of a pulse, then moved to Leah, pulling the sobbing girl into a protective embrace. "It's all right," she murmured, and though she knew that some things would never be all right again, she knew that healing could begin to take place. She was proof of that. "It's all right. Let's get you out of here." She passed Leah off to Frost and stood, her mind processing the last few seconds. The last few weeks.

"I don't get too many happy endings in this job," Detective Monroe commented as he approached her, "so thank you."

Happy endings? One sister dead, another scarred for life. "How many more are out there?" she asked him, wondering what kind of a man could do a job that felt like bailing out the ocean with a teacup.

Instead of answering, he nodded toward the cluster of women who huddled together against a wall, expressions reflecting varying degrees of shock, fear, disbelief. "You see those women? You've just given them their lives back."

"I gave them a chance." Nothing more, nothing less, and it was entirely possible that some of them were already too damaged to take advantage of that chance.

"It's more than they had before," Monroe replied, his dark eyes watching her in a way that she'd seldom encountered. Most men saw her as either a woman or a cop; rarely as both, as though the two couldn't possibly coexist in the same person. "You take what victories you can." He hesitated, glanced around to be sure no one was nearby. "Would you like to have dinner sometime? Or just a drink?"

"I'd like that," she surprised herself by saying. "Just...give me a couple of days to process, all right?" She hadn't heard from Casey in weeks; she'd thought he might have called after the mess with Dominick, but -

Monroe nodded. "I'll call you," he promised, his eyes holding hers in a way that she knew meant that he'd follow through.

"Sounds good," she replied, giving him a crooked grin as she added, "Now, what do you say we clean up the shit?" she asked, gesturing at the fine, upstanding citizens who were lined up around the walls, still trying to come up with plausible sounding reasons for them to have been present at a slave auction.

His answering grin was wolfish. "My pleasure."

* * *

"You did good work today."

Jane turned her head, meeting Maura's eyes for the first time that evening. "Yeah?"

"Yes." Her friend's voice was firm, the warm approval in her eyes undiluted by any hint of censure or judgment, and Jane felt the last of the apprehension in her chest dissipate. She'd killed a man today, and regardless of the circumstance, she'd worried about how Maura might perceive it. "Harris lured innocent young women with the hope of a better life and sold them into slavery. He killed Anja because she tried to escape; he would have killed Leah for revenge. You saved her. You saved the rest of those girls. They have a chance now."

"You helped," Jane told her. "If you hadn't figured out the significance of that brand, been able to speak Serbian, we might never have realized that Harris was Cutthroat."

Maura nodded, looking suddenly shy. "I became a medical examiner to be a voice for the dead, to give them a chance of justice. It's rare when those voices lead to justice for the living, as well."

"Well, this time it did," Jane told her, lifting the bottle and refilling both their glasses. They were both drinking pinot noir, because Frankie and Frost had demolished her beer helping her new neighbor move in...before she'd gotten busted for dealing drugs. Which was why she and Maura were sprawled on her bare mattress in her living room. The new mattress was the final touch in the remodeling of her bedroom, because no way in hell could she sleep in the same damn room that that sick fuck Dominic had so slavishly recreated in the prison he'd held her in. New furniture, new curtains, new pictures, new by-God bed, and if Frankie and Frost weren't here to help her move it tomorrow, she'd damn well move it herself. Maura had been great about letting her stay at her place, but this was Jane's apartment, damn it, and she wasn't going to let some delusional nut job drive her out.

She took a healthy swallow of her wine. "I killed a man." Police terms were so sterile: 'Neutralized the threat', 'Discharged a weapon', 'Suspect dead on arrival'. "I shot him," she said flatly, refusing to sugar-coat it. "Three times."

"You did what you had to do." Maura settled to the mattress beside her, reaching out to slide her hand into Jane's.

"I know that," she replied. She'd gone over the customary endless replays in her head, come up with no other way the scenario could have gone down. "Do you?" Every cop she'd spoken to agreed that it was a clean shoot, but it wasn't their opinion that mattered.

"Yes." No hesitation, no impatience. Maura knew why she needed that reassurance, and she gave it unstintingly, the pressure of her hand underscoring her words. "You did the right thing today. You always do the right thing, no matter what it costs you, and that is what defines true courage." She wasn't just speaking of the events of today, and they both knew it.

Jane nodded, feeling the tightness in her throat. She was no hero, damn it, but for her best friend, she would always do her damnedest to be one. "Think you can help me get this mattress into my bedroom tomorrow?"

"As long as it's tomorrow and not tonight." Maura set her nearly empty glass on the floor and let her head droop onto the mattress, her eyes already drifting closed.

"Definitely," Jane mumbled, feeling the last of the day's adrenaline being borne away on wine and relief. This was safety, this was peace, and she let her mind go, fading toward sleep with Maura's hand in hers.

* * *

_Two weeks later._

"Get your hands off of her!" Frost shouted

"Maura, you okay?" Jane's eyes swept the loft.

"What are you doing?" the surprised bafflement in the doctor's eyes shifted to terror when Rockmond hauled her back against him and put a knife to her throat.

_Shit, shit, shit._

Panic tried to boil up, but Jane locked it down, keeping her gun leveled at Rockmond, fighting the need to obliterate that face with a hail of bullets. The knife was too close; trigger the wrong reflex, and Maura would die with him, her life's blood pouring onto the floor from a severed jugular or carotid.

_No._

"See those pedestals?" Rockmond dragged Maura through his 'studio' as Jane, Vince and Barry fanned wider, each trying to find a clear shot without setting up a crossfire. "You were going to be my latest creation. I was going to honor you, like I did my mother, who gave me life."

His mother: the prostitute who abused him. At another time, Jane might have felt a degree of sympathy, but he'd made his choices, killed again and again, and now it was Maura he was threatening.

"You must think you're really smart." He'd emerged from the studio, sidestepping, always keeping Maura in front of him.

"No." Jane shook her head. "Just lucky. You're much smarter." Tell the bastard what he wanted to hear, pray for the opening.

"Damn right!" he bragged. "Not even the genius Dr. Isles could keep up with me!"

"Please!" Maura sobbed, tears in her eyes.

"Begging?" Rockmond smirked. "Keep begging." His eyes lifted to Jane's, a satisfied smile touching his lips. "I like it when they beg."

Two more sidesteps, and Jane realized her mistake too late. He was standing right in front of the open elevator shaft they'd seen on the way up. Three stories straight down. She knew sick bastards like Rockmond, like Hoyt. They might give themselves up if it suited their purposes, but they would never, _ever _release a chosen victim. If they didn't act, Maura was going to die: by his knife or in the fall.

"Korsak, Harris, put your guns away!" she barked, hoping like hell that Frost would understand. He was the only one fast enough to make this plan work.

"Done, Jane," Barry spoke up as he and Vince holstered their weapons, and she knew that the message had been received. She had a shot: the same shot she'd taken at Chris Harris, but the open shaft behind Rockmond was the wild card. Someone would have to pull Maura from his grasp before he could drag her over. Frost had accepted the challenge; he knew as well as she did that this endgame had only two possible outcomes, neither of which included Rockmond's survival.

"You found my mother's hand?" Rockmond demanded, inching backward a bit.

Jane nodded. "Yeah." She lowered her own gun, but did not holster it.

"You understand why I had to take both of them, right?" His eyes pleaded with her for understanding. She gave it to him, calling on years of empathizing with perps, luring out confessions with false sympathy: sure, you needed the money; sure, the bitch was asking for it, dressing like that, teasing you that way. Whatever was needed to get them to open up and spill the pustulence of their true thoughts out into the record. "So she couldn't hurt you any more." _She should have drowned you at birth, you piece of shit._

He kept babbling his justifications, kept edging toward the shaft, but Jane's eyes remained fixed on his hand, on the distance between the knife's edge and Maura's neck, on the distance between his feet and the edge of the shaft, saw with hellish clarity the point of no return, the moment of decision. No amount of reasoning was going to keep him from killing Maura as his final act of defiance and control.

"Now!" she shouted, and Frost was in motion even as her gun came up, front and rear sights aligning with the center of Rockmond's forehead, her finger squeezing the trigger at the same instant. He jerked, the knife hand falling away as the back of his head blew out from the bullet's exit, his other arm tightening convulsively on Maura as he started to pitch backward, but Frost was there, grabbing her arm and yanking her away, leaving Rockmond to tumble into the abyss alone.

Jane stood frozen, gun extended, her mind replaying every way those last seconds could have gone wrong: Maura shot, Maura cut, Maura dragged into the shaft with the bastard. Her hands started to shake.

"Easy, Rizzoli." Korsak was there, hands gently pressuring her to lower the gun, taking it from nerveless fingers. She could hear Maura sobbing as she made her way to the open shaft, looked down to the bloody ruin of Dennis Rockmond's body, alone at the bottom. There had been no hesitation; there was no guilt.

She turned away, caught Maura as she stumbled forward, held her tight, murmuring reassurances.

Judge, jury and executioner.

She could live with that.

* * *

_A.N. - I was going to stop with 'Cuts Like A Knife', but the events at the end of 'Melt My Heart To Stone' were entirely too similar, the shot that Jane was faced with was almost identical. IMO, they botched Rockmond's behavior at the end; I don't believe that he would have released Maura after having already made the decision to kill her._ _And I'm not implying that Jane is going to become some kind of killing machine, but rather she is once again accepting the risks and responsibilities that are inherent in the job, including killing a perp when the situation requires it._


End file.
